


To Protect

by Mawgon



Category: The Goblin Emperor - Katherine Addison
Genre: Gen, Harm to hands, Sexual Violence, Suicide
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-04
Updated: 2016-12-09
Packaged: 2018-08-19 14:07:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 36
Words: 41,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8211250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mawgon/pseuds/Mawgon
Summary: Why would a cleric of Csaivo change her career plans to become nohecharo? Why would she volunteer to serve an emperor she has never met? This is Kiru's story.





	1. A woman's sense of wrong

Unmoving, Kiru stood by her sister’s corpse. Death by poison, it was obvious. Normally, no one would have investigated the death of a simple servant girl, but poison ... poison could easily have been in something coming from the emperor’s table, something he had not consumed by mere chance. 

The stakes were too high. 

“We see flowers”, said the witness. “Flowers of silver and gold ... a carpet, we think, unusually close to the eye.”

Kiru willed her ears not to move. Not a flicker. Those very flowers. The carpet of the royal bedroom her sister had cleaned so many times, and had been so proud of. 

“And we see a ... an undergarment. It is clean, but it should not be ...” He was confused. Of course he would be. 

Kiru was not. She was young, too young yet to have experienced it, but she had been trained as a cleric of Csaivo. The monthly bleeding, dreaded but expected, its absence dreaded by unmarried women ...

“A face .... ah! This is not the circumstance of her death, a memory only. She thought of the Prince in death, she must have been worried for his safety.”

 

The death was declared an accident, as no trace of the rat poison, used by the servants to keep pests under control, could ever be found in meals destined for the emperor, the prince or the archdukes. 

 

Yet Kiru knew. She knew that the poison did not kill fast – there would have been time to seek help. Her sister had known how it worked, of course, everyone knew the symptoms. Even if not, the pain would have driven her to Kiru.

If she had wanted to survive. 

She had been strange months before that, Kiru remembered well. Shaken. Frightened. Certainly not in love. No. 

Kiru was young, but not ignorant. A healer heard much.

She knew who had killed her sister, as surely as if he had driven a dagger into her heart.


	2. The one who guards your life

Not long after that, Kiru had applied to train as nohecharo. “We feel so helpless about our sister’s death”, she had said. “And what if it was no accident? If it was an attempt on his Serenity’s life? We wish to protect.”

It was all true. 

“You are trained as healer”, the Adremaza had said. “As a nohecharis, you would have to learn how to hurt, how to kill.”

“We are prepared to do what it takes”, she had replied, her head bowed. “We wish to learn how to prevent harm before healing is necessary. We do not like to cause harm, but we are prepared to do it.”

Again, nothing but the truth. 

Normally, a woman would not even have been considered for training in the more dangerous mazeise arts. But there were few with mazeise talents. Fewer still who had it in them to become dachenmazei. And of those, few were naive enough to worship the emperor in their hearts and want to die for him. 

So she had taken up training. Part time, while she also continued to serve as cleric of Csaivo. Every evening she said her prayers, asking forgiveness of the Lady of Rivers. If forgiveness was needed. Perhaps, Csaivo would understand. 

Kiru still abhorred killing, but the flies that gathered around the kitchen waste in summer would not live long anyway.  
Long hours she spent, looking at them, weaving the words of the revethmaz. Again and again, until she could cast it without even moving her lips. 

When the emperor died, Kiru was ready. She was the best. 

The Prince looked at her coldly. “No.”

He did not say more than that, and for some moments, Kiru feared he knew. Then she scolded herself for such irrational thoughts. He did not know. He had not known that the girl he had raped had had a younger sister. Or that she had been an orphan. All this did not matter to a prince, much less to an emperor. 

Becoming one of his nohecharei would have been the perfect opportunity. But all was not lost. 

Kiru continued her training. How to recognize the spells cast by others. How to unmake them. She befriended the servants who cleaned the emperor’s chambers, those who prepared his meals, those who laundered his bedlinen. In what free time she had, she tended to their wounds, recommended herbs for their illnesses and slowly won everyone’s gratitude. 

One by one she won them over, until only the household steward remained. It was alright. One day, Echelo Esaran would be indisposed. Ill, or perhaps visiting relatives. Attending a funeral. Something. And then ... all kinds of things could happen then.  
A nohecharis had to study all the ways an emperor could be murdered.


	3. Chapter 3

“The Wisdom of Choharo crashed.”

“No. No!”Later, Kiru could not have said how long she stood there. Pale, ears flattened against her head. This could not have happened. It simply could not. She had been close, so close. 

Later, the Adremaza had spoken to her. “You are the best, still”, he had confided. “But ...”

“We cannot”, she had whispered. “We are ... shaken.” The new emperor. Not much was known of the Archduke Maia Drazhar. Kiru had no reason to wish him dead, but neither had she reason to give her life in his service. 

Her life had been meant to be given in revenge for her sister. And now? What was it worth now? Could she go back to healing, deprived of the goal she had lived for those past twenty years? 

“We understand. You wished to serve Varenechibel, and now, this cruel fate has taken away that chance, forever. We will find someone else.”

And, of course, it was very likely that the new emperor did not want a female nohecharis any more than the old emperor. 

 

The news that Cala had volunteered for, and gotten the position, came as a shock. Dazhis had been expected. He had always been ambitious. Rather, it was a surprise he had only made second nohecharis. 

But Cala ... neither had he ever worshipped the royal family, nor had he ever cared much for the fame. 

“Why?” she asked when he had finally finished his first shift. 

Cala shrugged. “What else could I do? Sure, sure, become Adremaza, but that is a rather boring job. I like a challenge.”

“A challenge”, she echoed. “That is why thou volunteered’st for this ... revethvoraneise position?”

His eyes lit up. “Of course! Need’st not worry, I am good! And while his Serenity has many enemies, none of them are as powerful as Orava the Usurper.” He blinked. “Didst not want to become nohecharo thyself?”

She had not often talked about it, but of course he knew. “There is always some risk. But not as many people wanted Varenechibel dead.” She only knew of one. 

“Someone has to protect him”, Cala stated sensibly. “And ... you know, I only volunteered because I wanted the challenge, but if I die protecting him ... he is worth it.”

“Thou thinkst so?”

“Truly. He ... well. He treats us almost as his equals, which of course he should not, and Beshelar disapproves, but ...”

Kiru nodded. Of course. The Archduke Maia Drazhar had not grown up at court. It would be difficult for him to understand what his new position meant. Perhaps he would get used to it. Learn to treat people like furniture ... or worse. “So the rumours are not true?”

“Rumours?” Cala blinked like a owl woken at noon. He was a genius as maza, but all information not relevant to his studies just flew over his head. 

“Rumours. That his mental faculties are ... lacking.” The rumours were way less polite than that. 

Cala blinked again. “He seems perfectly normal. Somewhat lost and confused, but not ... in fact, he could be very clever. Thou know’st what people said about us ...”

“That thou couldst not tie thine own shoelaces. Yes. I remember. And I am still not entirely sure if thou couldst do so with thy fingers.” She smiled. “Which did not hinder thee from becoming dachen’maza.”

“Exactly.”

There were other rumours as well, slowly trickling down to where Kiru would hear them, while treating the cut fingers and burnt hands of the kitchen staff. 

Mer Aisava’s sudden promotion. The man was a courier, and everyone knew what they said about couriers. 

And the opera singer. Rumour had it that the emperor talked to her a lot. Everyone knew what they said about women who performed on stages, be it actresses or opera singers, too. 

Cala never gave any reason to assume that he even knew of those rumours, much less witnessed any of the things they spoke of. 

There were other things Cala did speak of. His Serenity’s half-sister, whose marriage to Tethimar had been cancelled on the grounds of her being in mourning. Or possibly her not wishing to get married. And he had called Arbelan “zhasanai”

Foolish. Kind, but foolish. The boy would be dead before long. And Cala with him.


	4. The maza that's well dressed

And then, _of course_ , Dazhis went and betrayed his emperor and fellow nohecharei. 

Kiru berated herself. She should have seen it coming. She should have volunteered. Had Edrehasivar been killed ... there would have been the expectation that his failed nohecharei commit revethvoran.  
Cala was too young to die. 

And Edrehasivar VII was, too. What Cala had told her sounded almost too good to be true. If the new emperor truly was that kind, he deserved her protection. 

Varenechibel IV would quite probably have ordered Telimezh’s revethvoran for the failure to suspect a betrayal. The new emperor had not even accepted his resignment. 

Edrehasivar had stated that Telimezh could not possibly be blamed for trusting his partner, Cala had told her. A sensible statement. One she would never have expected from the emperor. 

When the Adremaza approached her this time, she volunteered readily. 

“There is no one else”, he admitted. “If, perhaps, we introduce you as his new nohecharis ... he might not notice ....” There was desperation in his voice. He did not want to force someone to take the position, but of course, he had to send the emperor a replacement. A replacement that the emperor would want. 

“That will never work.” She did not have large breasts, but they were visible. Her voice was too high. And a situation would, no doubt, arise where it was not possible to keep such a secret. “Yet perhaps he will accept us nonetheless. We can hope.”

Seeing him in person for the first time, she would almost have laughed. He was just a boy. The emperor, yes, but still, despite all the jewels, he looked like someone whom she would adress as “michen”. 

Lost and confused, indeed. Oh, he did a good job at hiding it. Yet it was there. 

But as Cala had said, he was not stupid. He noticed at once that what he was offered was a nohecharo – though his voice squeaked slightly at pronouncing it. 

Of course he had reservations. Not, it seemed, about giving such an important position to a woman, but about having a woman in his bedchamber. Kiru had to will herself to not smile at his innocence. The fact that Beshelar was scandalized at the very idea of a woman seeing the emperor in his nightshirt proved that the lieutnant had not witnessed anything of the sort that Varenechibel would have been up to.  
And those rumours about Min Vechin and the emperor were obviously all malicious slander. As were, she supposed, those about Csevet. She had no doubt that witnessing _that_ would have numbed Beshelar’s reaction to the idea of a woman in close proximity to the emperor. 

The fact that she was a cleric of Csaivo did, in the end, convince the emperor that there was nothing untoward about her guarding his bedchamber. 

She did not even have to mention that it might be more comfortable for the empress to have a woman see her in _her_ nightshirt, a thought that had somehow failed to enter Beshelar's mind. 

Varenechibel would never have wondered why someone would want to be his nohecharis. Edrehasivar did. Yes, he was definitely a clever one. 

And then he broke eye contact and asked for her forgiveness. 

What a sweet boy!


	5. Chapter 5

One of the first things she saw him to while on duty was refusing the Tethimada’s invitation to stay at their fortress. He would probably have done so in any case – he was a clever one – but hearing that Tethimar had once tried to rape Csevet shocked him to a degree that she had not expected in a man his age. 

Though she was not entirely sure he even understood that that was what Tethimar had intended to do. 

And then he went to talk to Dazhis. Intuitively, she told him about the bridge, not expecting an answer, just hoping to soothe his nerves. It was, after all, her job now, to guard his spirit. 

Dazhis’ reasons were exactly what she had imagined them to be. Ambition. Of course. She had been foolish to believe he was content with the position of second nohecharis. Or happy with the new emperor. 

Edrehasivar was young and unexperienced. A mere boy. No emperor one could look up to. No emperor that could make one proud to be his nohecharis. 

Of course Dazhis had not liked that. 

Was there danger from any of the other nohecharei? Beshelar was, perhaps, not loyal to the emperor, but would be loyal to his own oath. Propriety was everything to him, and he had had the rare good luck to have found an emperor who shared his notions of what was proper – where it mattered. Varenechibel would not have treated his nohecharei as equals, but he would have forced them to witness much worse things than women seeing him in his nightshirt.   
Telimezh would likely be loyal now, because he had been so kindly forgiven. 

Cala was to be trusted, that she knew. 

She would make sure the edocharei could be trusted, too. And the other servants ... none of them loyal to the position, but most of them grateful to Kiru ... 

And then Edrehasivar was offered the opportunity to pray in the Ulimeire. 

That took Kiru by surprise. While few would have dared deny an emperor entry – though that was not without precedence – inviting him was a different thing altogether. It was well known that piety was not fashionable at court, and of course, that bred resentment. 

For all Kiru could remember, only the empress Chenelo had ever ... Chenelo Zhasan, of course! She was the current emperor’s mother! Kiru knew that, but up to now had somehow not considered what that must mean. 

She remembered the goblin woman. She had been something of a regular presence during her short stay. She had been there, be the weather good or bad, reliable as the sunrise, and always had a kind word for even the lowest of servants ... Empress Chenelo. Kiru had not spoken to her, personally, but she remembered the general opinion, and it had been very favourable among the clerics. 

There had been hope she might make piety fashionable again, but that hope had died soon once it became apparent how much Varenechibel resented his wife. If anything, Chenelo Zhasan had made piety less fashionable. 

Kiru was not surprised that his Serenity accepted. Of course he would. His mother had raised him alone, far away from the court. Her influence, naturally, would persist. 

She watched him kneel and pray, and could not help but hear the words of his prayer. Truly, this was Chenelo’s son. 

Kiru watched the surroundings, not daring to be less attentive for even a moment, though she dearly wished to pray herself. It would have to wait.


	6. Chapter 6

When he offered her to leave, to get out of the cold, she declined. She would have, in any case, but she did not even wish to leave. Instead, she longed to place a hand on his skinny shoulder as they watched the revethvoran. 

This was not something an innocent boy ought to see. 

Finally, it was over, and Kiru was relieved to see that Telimezh was as worried about his Serenity’s wellbeing as her. 

Immediately after ending her shift, Kiru went to the kitchens, where she found out that Isheian had been tasked with serving the new emperor’s meals. 

After her initial failure, she had not taken as much interest in the goings-on as she had before. People had attributed to her being in mourning. As if. 

“See to it that his Serenity has a peaceful evening”, she said calmly. “Not that thou wouldst do anything less, anyway, but ... he has witnessed Dazhis revethvoran and is ... shaken.”

The girl paled, her ears moved to lie flat against her head. “No!”

“It was an undeserved kindness”, Kiru stated. “Dahzis had no one else.”

Isheian relaxed a bit and nodded. “His Serenity is very kind.” And she reported some few incidents where he had shown himself to be so. 

She would be loyal. 

It was easy – too easy – to get Isheian to show her where his Serenity’s cups and plates were kept. Kiru silently cast a maz to check for poison. 

This was very advanced – above the level of a mere dachenmaza, one would qualify for Adremaza with it, were one not a woman – as after all, every substance could be a poison. One had to be able to recognize the patterns of plants used to make soap, plants used in food, and plants used in the cupboards to keep the pests at bay, and then distinguish them from plants that had no right to be anywhere close to the kitchen. 

Cala would know the patterns of the few most popular poisons, and check for those, but that was because he was very, very good at what he did. 

It would have been easy to poison Varenechibel. And Kiru would have done it long before, had she not feared that his ire, or that of his heir, would extend to the kitchen staff. 

She had not ruled it out, had ruled nothing out, but she had hesitated. Had wanted to be sure that no one loyal to him remained, so that no one would be able to thwart the attempt. 

Perhaps she would have done it in the end, would have hoped that his heir would be content to have Kiru executed. 

 

After making sure that there was no trace of poison anywhere in the kitchen, she impressed upon Isheian the importance of not letting strangers in, ever. 

“There are those who want his Serenity dead. It is thy responsibility to not give anyone access to his food, or anything that might touch his food.”

“But ... Kiru Athmaza, we always welcomed you.”

“Thou shouldst not trust us. Shouldst trust no one, be they maza or cleric, or nobleman. Shouldst be wary even of thy fellow servants.” Though it was unlikely that any servant ever would have her own reasons to want Edrehasivar dead. “Listen; if some noble approached thee to offer thee a place in a plot against his Serenity’s life, what wouldst thou do?”

“I would rather die than accept such an offer!” Isheian raised her voice, and several servants on the other side of the room turned their heads. 

“Shush. Art noble, but needst to learn to be more cunning. No, thou shouldst be hesitant, then, after some persuading, agree. And then shouldst come to us, or to the emperor himself. He is kind. He will listen. He will protect thee. It is dangerous, of course, but we will tell his Serenity what we advised thee to do.”

Isheian nodded, ears flicking with rapt attention. “You are very wise, Athmaza. I shall do just that. Pretend to work for them, then tell you all.”

“Good.”

There was no time, now, to speak to those who laundered the emperor’s bedlinens, but Kiru knew the bed was only changed weekly, so there was still time for that.

Now, she would pray. 

 

She went to the Chapel of All Gods. First she thanked Ulis for helping her to let go of her anger.  
Varenechibel was dead, and she found that she did not much mind anymore that it had not been her hand that had ended him. 

Her thanks to Csaivo took more time. 

She had just finished the last prayer when she noticed that a canon was watching her with a frown on his face. She had seen him, but not talked to him before. 

“This is not a prayer that we ever thought to hear from a cleric of Csaivo.” There was a question and a reproach in his voice. 

Of course. She had spoken the prayer to thank Csaivo for blessing her with a child. 

“We were speaking metaphorically, of course.” 

“You have been made nohecharis. This is your first and foremost duty now. And now, already, you let yourself be distracted by ... children, metaphorical or otherwise? We told the Adremaza that it was a bad idea, a nohecharo.” He emphasized the last syllabe. 

At some other time, perhaps that would have angered Kiru. Yet now, she found she did not care. He was many years her junior, what he thought did not matter. 

“This is between me and Csaivo”, she reproached him, no emotion in her voice. Listening to, and commenting on other people’s prayers, let alone a cleric’s, was very improper.

“His Serenity –“

“Is always in our thoughts and our heart. Needst not worry. We will do our duty, and better than many a male nohecharis”, she replied pointedly. 

At that, he finally relented and left. 

She ended her day with a visit to the Empress Chenelo’s tomb.


	7. Chapter 7

After her next shift, Kiru had been planning to visit the laundry, but she had just finished her meal in the room outside the emperor’s bedchamber when Isheian entered and strode towards her. 

“Athmaza ...” The girl seemed embarrassed. 

“What is it, michen?” Kiru asked gently. 

“I thought you might want to know ... there are ... rumours.”

“Rumours? Concerning the emperor?”

“There are those.” Isheian’s ears flicked. “But those I mean are about ... you. They are untrue, I am sure!”

Ah. Of course. “The rumours about the emperor are untrue, also”, she said. “The court gossips, it is nothing new. Tell me, what do they say?”

“They ... they accuse you of ... of breaking your ... vows.” Isheian’s ears moved rapidly. “As a cleric, that is”, she hastened to add. 

As long as no one accused her of scheming against the emperor it couldn’t be so bad. “Oh. Entertaining. Did we acquire our position as nohecharo in the same way Mer Aisava got promoted?”

Isheian blushed. So she had heard those rumours, too. Working in such a large household really was detrimental to a child’s purity of mind. “Not ... not exactly. The rumours claim that ... that you are with child.”

“Do they, now?” Interesting. That pinpointed the source of it. “By whom? His Serenity?” She allowed herself to smile at the laughable thought. 

The girl nodded. “Not Edrehasivar”, she specified. “But ... it is said that you gave thanks to Csaivo. And that you visited the tomb of the late emperor.”

Kiru chuckled. “Rest assured, it is all lies.”

Isheian relaxed. “Of course.”

“We did indeed give thanks to Csaivo for the birth of one of Varenechibels sons. However, we were almost twenty years late in doing so. And we visited the tomb of Chenelo Zhasan. Her son truly is a blessing to us. That is the truth of it. Someone must have followed us. We will speak to the relevant authorities about it.”

 

Guarding the emperor took up most of her time, and now she had to waste precious hours on this. If she had known ... but she had not, and could not change the past. She would have to be more careful when praying in the future. 

She could, of course, just wait until it became obvious that she was not pregnant. Visiting the laundry should take precedence. However. Her own reputation was also relevant. She was the first nohecharo to ever be appointed, and there were enough things one could leverage against his Serenity already, no need to add to it. 

After all, it was extremely unlikely that those who wished him dead were only half as creative as Kiru had been in her planning. And the next regular change of bedsheets was still three days away. 

So this short space of time was used up, and Kiru got nothing else done on that day. 

Kiru had escorted his Serenity to his bedchamber, where he was going to be guarded by Cala and Beshelar, and was walking towards the laundry, when Eivo, one of the laundresses, approached her. 

“Kiru Athmaza, a word, please.” Her ears did not betray any emotion, a feat acquired by years of training. Her voice, however, sounded strained. “It is probably nothing, but ... Isheian told us to ...”

“Ah. Of course.” She beckoned Eivo closer and cast a maz that would ensure they were not overheard. “Do tell us.”

“Mer Iva had us change his Serenity’s sheets today.” 

Iva was in charge of the laundry, and made such decisions. So far, so normal. “This is not according to schedule?” She knew it was not. 

“No. And this ... it was not unusual for Varenechibel. We often had to change his sheets ahead of schedule. But the new emperor ... his sheets never ... they were never ... soiled before. It was my turn to scrub the sheets, and ... and there was nothing to scrub, Kiru. There was nothing at all!”

Cold crept through Kiru’s body, as though her blood had turned to ice. “It might be harmless, but we will not take that risk. Fetch the Adremaza to his Serenity’s bedchamber. Hurry. Tell no one of your purpose if you can at all avoid it.”

Eivo’s eyes went wide, her ears moved back. “If we cannot?”

“Invent something if asked. Tell the mazei that the emperor’s nohecharis sends you. We take the responsibility.“

There was a risk, but not much. If this was false alarm, the emperor would forgive her. 

She was out of breath when she arrived in the antechamber. “Beshelar, we must see his Serenity. Now.”

He looked as though he would refuse for a moment, but then nodded and rushed to the door, knocked in the rhythm he and Cala had agreed on, and entered. 

Kiru did not wait for his say-so before she burst into the room. “Serenity?!”

There was no answer. 

“He is asleep”, Cala hissed. “What’s toward?”

“Poison. Beshelar, drag him out of bed.”


	8. Chapter 8

Kiru started casting immediately. It was worse than she had suspected, the nightshirt had been meddled with, too. “Remove his shirt. Beshelar, please trust me.”

The word ‘poison’ had spurred Beshelar into action, and the fact that Maia did not wake upon being dragged out of bed made him comply with her orders. By the time she started to cast the maz to enhance the activity of liver and kidneys, he had already stripped off the nightshirt and thrown Maia over his shoulder to rush him to the bathroom. “Can we wash him, or will that worsen things?”

“Take care he doesn’t lie in the used water.” Kiru took one of Maia’s hands and felt for his pulse. It was there, but weak. His breathing was fast, too fast. “Cala, canst check ...?”

“I’m at it.”

When they had him in the bathtub, his edocharei had woken and were sent to fetch more water. 

The first bucket of water made Maia stir. 

“Serenity?”

“Beshelar? What is ... why?!” 

“Kiru says you have been poisoned.”

“Oh.” He ceased his weak struggles. “I am cold. So cold.”

Ah. “Serenity, what do you see? Anything unusual?”

“Everything is ... green?”

That narrowed it down. “Wolfsbane. We need to keep his blood flowing. Breathe, Serenity. We have everything under control.” She hoped her voice radiated more confidence than she felt. 

He was whimpering in pain when the edocharei arrived with hot water. Kiru had them scrub his skin with soap, then soak towels in the hot water and place them on his body to keep him warm. 

Maia’s breath was now shallow, and his head had fallen against Beshelar’s chest where the nohecharis had to steady it with his free hand. Had to. Certainly was not stroking his emperor’s hair. Must be a trick of the dim light. 

At last, Kiru decided to interrupt her work to say something.“Soothing the pain will have no adverse effect. Cala?” 

He seemed almost relieved to finally be able to do something. 

Kiru worked without pause to keep Maia breathing and his heart beating, but she knew she could not keep it up much longer. Why did the Adremaza take so long?

 

“Kiru Athmaza? We have been told ...”

“Hurry! The emperor is dying!” Finally! “It is wolfsbane.”

Proving that he held his position for a reason, the Adremaza rushed forward without asking further questions and examined his Serenity.


	9. Chapter 9

Proving that he held his position for a reason, the Adremaza rushed forward without asking further questions and examined his Serenity. 

“You have handled the situation admirably. We can do no more. The maz for enhancing liver activity is what we would have chosen, and you already did that.”

“What?!”

Kiru quickly recovered from her shock. The situation required fast thinking. “Take him to a bed. Not his!”

“Our bed is not nearly good enough for his Serenity, but ...” Nemer started. 

“Right. Take him there. Keep him warm. Where is Eivo? The laundress?”

“She is waiting outside, we believe.”

“Then fetch her”, Kiru snapped. “Keep her safe!”

She had no time to worry about having spoken like this to a superior, she had to run after the others. As soon as they had lowered Maia on the edocharis’ bed, she went back to casting. 

“Cala, I will have to draw on my own lifepower soon.”

“The Adremaza –“

“Is no cleric of Csaivo.” And had explicitly stated he could do no more. 

“There must be an other way.”

“I could do it the mundane way.” Kiru frowned. This emperor would probably prefer that. Though it was no easy choice. “Thinkst he will prefer me to blow breath into his nose, or shouldst thou do it?” If she even mentioned the possibility of pressing her lips on the emperor’s, Beshelar would quite probably have a heart attack. 

“I will. Tell me how.” 

Kiru stared at Beshelar. She had not expected him, of all people, to offer. “Good. I will keep his heart going.”

“Out of mere curiosity”, Cala asked after she had explained and they had started their respective tasks. “Why would you draw on your own life rather than do this?”

“I feared Beshelar would think it improper. And, of course, there’s the likelihood that trying to keep his Serenity’s heart going like this will break a rib or two.” She pressed down on his skinny chest as she said it. At least it would be easy to see if his ribs were broken, she could feel them under her hands. 

“He will prefer that to you following in the footsteps of Hanevis Athmaza.”

“Hanevis” Beshelar paused to blow some air into Maia’s nose. “Athmaza” Pause. “Was a” Pause. “Hero.”

“And dead” Cala remarked drily. 

The edocharei brought hot bricks for the bed, and Kiru asked for some liquorice next. “Do not tell anyone it is for his Serenity, though.”

“I happen to have some with me.” Avris said. “A ... habit. What do you need it for?”

“Brew tea with it. Taken in moderation, it strengthens the heart.” 

When he returned with the tea, sufficiently cooled down to drink, Kiru asked him to drink a third of it and swallow while she watched. He did so without hesitation. 

“Good. Now, here.”

Getting Maia to swallow it was easier than might be expected. “Mother?” he mumbled. 

Beshelar drew his hand back from where it had rested on Maia’s hair as though he had been slapped. “Serenity. We apologize.”

Kiru felt his pulse. Stable. She could risk to stop now. 

“What for? What happened?” Maia blinked. “Where am ... where are we?”

“You were poisoned, Serenity. Desperate measures were necessary. How do you feel?”

He blinked again. “Cold, except for our feet. Our chest aches.”

“Can you move your fingers?”

“Yes.” 

“Good. You are in your edocharei’s quarters. Nemer was generous enough to offer his bed. Your bedlinen and nightshirt were poisoned.”

“My nightshirt? Why would anyone poison my ...” She saw on his face the realization that being seen by a woman in his nightshirt was no longer the worst that had happened. 

“We do apologize. It was the only way. Your chest aches because we have likely broken a rib in our attempts to keep your heart going.” Varenechibel would have demanded revethvoran. 

“Oh. Good.” 

“We will check in what position your ribs are, and if they are where they should be, Cala can cast a maz to heal them.”

“Thank you. Is there a reason why you cannot do that yourself?”

“We ...”

“Kiru tried to keep your heart going by mazeise means, and would have gone the way of Hanevis Athmaza if she had continued to do so”, Cala interrupted. “She is drained.”

Maia’s ears moved flat against his head. “What?” 

“Cala suggested that you might not appreciate that, Serenity.” She had finished checking his ribs and gave Cala a short nod. 

“Not ... appreciate? Kiru, I ... we prefer that you stay alive. A lack of appreciation is ... is not what ...”

“We know that, Serenity.” And that, right there, was why she would give her life to save him. “We shall now leave you in the care of your edocharei, as we need to find out who made this latest attempt on your life. Cala knows how to check for poison, now that we know what to look for.” She shot him a questioning look, and he gave a slight nod. He knew how to check for wolfbane. Good. “All clothes need to be checked. Preferably use some that have not been laundered recently.”

The edocharei’s quarters were connected to the antechamber. There was the Adremaza, and Eivo, and just as she entered, the door to the corridor flew open and Mer Aisava stormed in. 

He only bowed to the Adremaza with the minimum of courtesy, then glared at her. “What is going on here? You are off duty! And his Serenity is – or should be – asleep by now!”

“His Serenity is now being tended to by his edocharei. There was an attempt on his life, but we are confident we could thwart it.”

Aisava’s ears flicked back and forth. “Why were we not informed?”

“There was no time. We are sure his Serenity will be pleased to see you as soon as he is dressed.” Kiru cleared her throat. “If you wish to assist in finding out who is responsible for this, we would be glad to accept your help.”

“Do we have your word that his Serenity is unharmed? On your oath as nohecharo?”

“You do have our word that we did everything we could to counteract the effects of the poison. When we left his Serenity, he was alert and the pain had subsided. We know the poison used and believe his condition will not worsen.”

Aisava’s eyes went wide, and his ears pinned back, but in a moment, he had himself under control and gave a sharp nod. “What can we do to assist you?”

“We believe that someone must have told those responsible that we warned the kitchen staff. Mer Iva, who oversees the laundry, ordered his Serenity’s bedsheets changed this evening, outside of the usual schedule.”

“The laundry?” Aisava seemed confused. “What does this have to do with an attempt at poisoning?”

“It was the nightshirt and sheets that were poisoned, Mer Aisava, not the food. The conspirators must have been warned. Otherwise, they would have stuck to the usual schedule. In fact, had we had the opportunity to talk to the laundresses, we would have cautioned them against giving anyone not entirely trustworthy access to his Serenity’s clothes.”

“The clothes!”

“Indeed. Now, what we would have you do is fetch us Isheian. It was her whom we warned, and we need to know to whom she spoke since then, and how the news got out.”

“We can do that. This Iva, should we have him arrested?”

“Not yet. The guards should watch him, and prevent any attempt at escaping. However, we believe he might already have gone to bed. It might be wiser to let the conspirators believe that they succeeded, until tomorrow morning.”

“Understood.”

“And could you perhaps inform Telimezh first?” He would probably react like Aisava. Better to not make it worse. 

“Of course. He will be more willing to listen in any case.”

True. A nohecharis could simply not afford to hesitate for even a moment if the emperor’s safety was in danger. Telimezh would be wide awake and out of bed in an instant. The Captain might take longer to wake. 

Kiru dismissed Aisava with a sharp nod. 

Time was running short. Things needed to be done. Isheian would be fetched. Mer Iva was involved. But there were bound to be more. The whole laundry staff ...

“We will go check for poison in the laundry”, she had just announced, when Beshelar burst into the room. 

“Athmaza, the emperor orders you to his bedchamber.”

She frowned. “We are not on duty.”

“Athmaza. This is not a request. It is an order. His Serenity told me to emphasize that.”

“Kiru Athmaza is tired”, the Adremaza cut in. “Is his Serenity aware that casting even one single maz could damage her health irrevocably?”

“His Serenity is more than aware”, Beshelar assured. “Are you going to disobey his Serenity, Athmaza?”

“No, of course not.” She followed Beshelar into the emperor’s bedchamber. It made no sense. Had there been unexpected complications and Beshalar wanted to revenge his emperor, or ...?


	10. Chapter 10

“Ah, thank you, Beshelar. Kiru, please, sit.” Edrehasivar was not just wearing a nightshirt, there also was a loose-fitting dressing gown over it, closed with a belt. His hair had been braided, even. As Kiru had suspected, he had not gone to bed, but was seated in one of several armchairs.

She sat down in an armchair next to his. “Serenity?”

“We are aware you are not on duty. We beg your forgiveness, but we could not, in good conscience, let you investigate this matter any further. It would be dangerous. Cala told us that you should be wrapped in a warm blanket and provided with a hot drink. What kind of hot drink do you prefer?”

Cala, standing behind the emperor, shrugged and gave her a apologetic smile.   
Ah. Now, this did make a lot of sense. She should not have assumed that Maia would simply forget about the matter. “We have a preference for hot chocolate. But we do not want to inconvenience –“

“We believe you have earned it.” He turned his head to look at the servant who had been waiting in the corner. “Esha, can you acquire some hot chocolate without alerting anyone to the goings on here?”

“Yes, Serenity. It is no inconvenience, Athmaza.”

A moment later, Nemer arrived with a woolen blanket that was so thick she believed his Serenity must have ordered the very warmest blanket available. 

“Serenity? May we ask a favour?” Kiru asked cautiously when the edocharei were gone. 

“Of course.”

“We asked Mer Aisava to fetch Isheian to the antechamber. May we question her here? We do not suspect her of any involvement, and your nohecharei are here ...”

“Certainly. Csevet was here?”

“He wanted to see you, Serenity, but was content to have our word that you are in no danger. He saw that we have to act fast.”

“Ah. Yes. Could you explain all this, please? We are somewhat confused by what happened.”

Of course he would want an explanation for stripping off his nightshirt.

“How did you know we had been poisoned?” His Serenity continued. 

“We did not know, Serenity.” Chenelo Zhasan’s son deserved the truth. “At the time we arrived in your bedchamber, it was a mere suspicion.”

“Oh.” His ears flicked forwards with keen interest. “Why did you suspect it, then?”

“We were told that an out of schedule change of your bedsheets had been ordered. And that the sheets were not dirty.”

“And that caused you to suspect murder?” The surprise in his voice made him seem younger than he was. Or exactly as inexperienced in court life as he was. 

“This was the possibility we had to investigate first. Had you woken when Beshelar dragged you out of bed, we would have investigated another one.”

“You got Beshelar to drag us out of bed?” He turned to look at Beshelar, who was visibly uncomfortable. “That explains why he has felt the need to apologize to us that much. Beshelar, there is nothing improper in doing what is needed to save our life.”

“Serenity.” The nohecharis bowed his head. 

“We are surprised that you dared to order such treatment of our person on a mere suspicion.” His ears indicated no anger, so Kiru allowed herself to relax. 

“Serenity.” 

“Pleasantly surprised.” He smiled. “We would have it no other way. It is merely that we had not thought ... is it customary for nohecharei to act this way?”

Beshelar made a strangled sound. 

“We admit”, Kiru replied carefully. “That we would not have acted in the same way had we been one of your father’s nohecharei.” She would have been the one to poison the sheets. It was an idea she had toyed with for a long time. It would have been a kind of poetic justice. “Revethvoran for failing to save the emperor, or for treating him in an undignified manner without there being a danger ... it kills one just as dead, and the latter would be more of a stain on our honour.” For even trying to save the despicable man. “Many nohecharei have failed in the former way. It is almost expected. To be disciplined for a lack of respect, on the other hand ...”

Edrehasivar nodded. “We understand. We cannot imagine our father would have been so ... unwise.”

“Serenity?” It was obvious that he had wished to use a much stronger word. 

“We are confident that, if we do not punish you for treating us in an undignified way, no one will ever know that you have done so.”

“Of course not, Serenity”, Beshelar said. “Our lips are sealed.”

“If, however, we were to demand your revethvoran ... we cannot imagine the rumours that would arise as to what you must have done to warrant this.”

“Indeed. Nevertheless, we are glad that we guessed right and thus our actions are justified.” Kiru pulled the blanket around herself. Now that she was calming down, she was feeling cold. A common side effect of overtaxing one’s mazeise talent. And ... what had she just said? “We did not mean to imply –“

“Of course not.” His Serenity sighed. “We, too, are glad that you correctly guessed in which way the attempt on our life was being made. And we much prefer for you to rather risk some indignity than our life.” He regarded her with a frown. “However. We also would prefer for you to not risk your own life. We would have expected such a foolish behaviour from someone ten years younger ...”

Kiru noticed how his gaze flicked to Beshelar and back to her again. 

“... but not from you.”

“We are sorry, Serenity.”

“If there next is a choice to be made between your very life and some small discomfort to our person, we would prefer the physical discomfort to the grief we would feel if you were to die.”

“Yes, Serenity. We knew you had reservations of accepting a female nohecharo, and we ...”

“This was about not having to touch me?!” For a moment, his ears were flat against his head. “Please do not do this ever again! I – we ... we had not realized just the kind of situation that would arise ... we do have the utmost confidence that there will never be any impropriety. You _are_ a cleric of Csaivo.”

Esha had entered while his Serenity had talked, and Kiru could read on his face that the edocharis had heard the rumours about her. Just one short moment, before he had himself under control once more, and offered her the cup of hot chocolate as though offering sacrifice to a god. 

“Thank you.” She would have to do something about these rumours. The man who had spread them would be disciplined, but apparently, they had already spread much further.


	11. Chapter 11

Isheian was accompanied by Telimezh, and Kiru regretted that she had not been more specific. The girl was wearing only a nightshirt, with a cloak hastily thrown over it, and no shoes. And was currently prostrated on the floor. Servants were usually not required to, but this did look like an audience. 

“Stand on the bedside rug, will you?” 

That flower pattern ... Kiru felt sickness rise in her throat, but just for a moment. 

Isheian stood where the emperor had indicated, still trembling, but making an effort to seem composed. Her ears were unnaturally stiff, slightly quivering in an attempt to not show fear. 

“Kiru, you wanted to ask some questions?” 

She nodded. “You did well, Isheian.”

That seemed to put the girl somewhat at ease. 

“Because you told Eivo to not hesitate to come to us, we were warned, just in time. We merely wish to know if there was anyone whom you denied access to the kitchen.”

“There were several.” Isheian stared at her feet. “Eivo was one of them, we told her what you said. Then there was Dasma, a courier. And one ... we think she might have been called Cireto, or something like it? A servant of the Ceredada, she wore their livery.”

“What did they all want, respectively?”

“Eivo often visits – visited – to tell us the latest gossip. Dasma ... too.” 

Kiru well remembered that Dasma was sweet on the scullery maid, Ceneän. That was harmless enough. 

“The other one, well, she ... she also wanted to tell us the latest gossip.”

“Ah. May we ask which kind of gossip? It might be relevant.”

“The ... the gossip about you, Athmaza.”

That, of course, was no proof of evil intent. “Ah. We do not believe that has much political relevance. Can you give a description? Cireto, you say?” That name, she had not heard before, though she had talked to many servants of the Ceredada.

“We are not sure. Something similar.” However, she gave a good description of the person in question. Full blooded elf, delicate features, rather unpleasant voice. 

When Isheian had finished, Kiru nodded to Telimezh. “Would you fetch Eivo? She is still in the antechamber, we believe. If she has seen one of those people, too, that might prove important. And then, we would prefer that you or some trustworthy guard accompanies them back to their respective rooms.” Fortunately, Isheian had her own little sleeping chamber, big enough only for a bed, due to her position as the emperor’s personal server, which might necessitate her getting up at odd hours. So hopefully, fetching her had not alerted anyone. She turned to look at Isheian again. “We are sorry. We should have told Mer Aisava that he should give you time to get dressed.”

“We are glad to be able to be of service to our emperor.” Isheian sank into a deep curtsy. “Our comfort is of little consequence.”

“It does matter to us. We are truly sorry to have caused such a ... hassle.” Maia smiled wearily. “We do hope you will have a restful night.“

He really meant it, Kiru observed, but he could not have done it better had he set out to gain the undying loyalty of his servants. 

When Eivo entered, Maia hastily said. “Please remain standing. This is not an official audience, and we understand servants are not required to follow the strict rules for those every time they are in our presence. Rather, we ask your help.“

„Serenity.“ She sank into a curtsey.

„We are sorry to have left you waiting so long“, Kiru said. “We thank you for telling us of the irregularities you witnessed. They turned out to be very significant indeed. We now ask that you also tell us anything else you noticed was different from usual. Were there any visitors to the laundry that had not been there before? People, perhaps, that you have never seen before? Even if they were just servants come there to exchange some gossip, it might be important.” Kiru hesitated. “Serenity, can we assure Eivo that, if any slightly insulting gossip comes to light in those investigations, no one will be punished just for spreading it?”

“Of course.” The Emperor nodded graciously. „We are aware that our late father had not the highest opinion of us, and we can hardly blame anyone for believing him. We need you to tell us everything, and not withhold something because you are worried we might be insulted.”

“Yes, Serenity.” Eivo stared at her feet, her head dipped. The laundresses never had anything to do with the emperor, most never even met nobles. “We fear we might bore your Serenity, but ... there was something slightly out of the ordinary.”

“Please continue”, Kiru encouraged her when she did not speak again. 

“A servant brought us a garment of one of the noble ladies and asked us to launder it. This is not very unusual, it happens every couple of weeks or so.” Her ears went stiff with effort to not show her discomfort. “Sometimes, someone fears that a stain on their clothes might become a stain on their reputation, and they then prefer to send a trusted servant instead of those usually in charge of laundry. It is nothing that would concern your Serenity”, and here, Eivo spoke faster than before. “It is just petty things, really, that are nevertheless of importance to those individuals ...”

“We understand, but ask that in this case, you do tell us what the stain on the garment was.”

“It was an underskirt”, now Eivo’s face had gone slightly pink. “And we did think it strange that there was a stain of yoghurt on it, but we could see how the lady would prefer to not have this be common knowledge.”

The confusion on Maia’s face proved that he had not made the connection. 

“Could you identify to which noble house the servant belonged?”

“Ceredada”, Eivo admitted. “We are sure this is insignificant, but as we were asked to ...”

“Did the servant speak to anyone else?” The underskirt was just an excuse, Kiru was sure. 

“She did chat with some of us, and informed us of some rumours about you, Kiru Athmaza, that we know to be untrue. We told her so, and she said she did not believe them either, but only shared them for entertainment. We admit that we were amused.” Eivo frowned. „She did also talk to Mer Iva. We assume this was to ascertain that no one would mention her visit, as Mer Iva advised us not to talk about it, which he usually does not deem necessary, as we are known to treat such matters with discretion.” 

Kiru nodded slowly. “Are you sure you correctly identified the nature of the stains on that underskirt?” A noblewoman might be worried about the gossip any strange substance on her skirts might lead to, but this was rather too innocent to warrant such a visit. 

“We have been a laundress since we were thirteen, Athmaza, and there is nothing we have not seen. We are sure.”

“When was this? Was it today?”

“No, it was just after the ... the other attempt at ...”

“Just after the last regular change of sheets.” Kiru nodded. “Would it have been possible for the servant to give Mer Iva something?”

“Oh, she did give him something. Money, we assumed, for ensuring our discretion, but we did not see it.” She frowned. “We also think we saw her give him another piece of clothing. Perhaps something that required even more discretion.”

“Good. Does your Serenity have any more questions?”

Maia seemed rather embarrassed. “No, we do not. Thank you, Eivo, for telling us this. Lieutnant Telimezh is to make sure you arrive at your sleeping quarters safely. We wish you a peaceful night.”

When the laundress had left, he turned to Kiru. “We would conclude from this that the Ceredada are plotting against us. Yet we admit we are inexperienced in such matters.”

“We are sorry to say, Serenity, that so far we cannot see this leading to any other conclusion, either.” Though she was rather annoyed with the lack of forethought. Had they been so sure to succeed that they had not thought to hide their traces? 

Of course it was good that they were so bad at executing their assassination plans. Just ...


	12. Chapter 12

“Is there a chance that Csethiro is not involved?” Maia asked, startling Kiru from her thoughts. 

“That, we will have to find out.” It was strange, though. “You have shown the family a lot of favour by proposing to Dach’osmin Ceredin. It is a politically advantageous match, and one would have expected that, if at all, an attempt on your life from that side would come only after they have reaped the benefits.”

“That is a very ... cold way of seeing things”, Maia said quietly. His ears drooped. “You are probably right, though. It still makes no sense. Csevet made is sound as though they intended to ... put forward their daughters, and that a proposal would not be seen as intrusion but as ... taking up such an offer? And he has reported that they are happy with the proceedings of the negotiations so far ... do you think it could be the rumours? Have we failed to prove them untrue?”

“We believe that it is no failing of your own, Serenity.” Kiru cleared her throat. “Serenity. We do not wish to imply anything, but … women have killed themselves to escape an unwanted marriage. It is not unheard of. From what we know of Dach’osmin Ceredin, it is not unthinkable that she would take a more ... proactive approach, as it were.“

“Oh.” It obviously failed to cheer him up. “Are we so repulsive?“

„It would have nothing to do with you.”

“How can it not? We were given to understand that our sister Vedero hates the thought of marriage on principle. But ... why? We are willing to marry Dach’osmin Ceredin, though we had to choose for political reasons. She is not unpleasant, and so we are content. Why would she think otherwise? Why would it have nothing to do with us?”

“Serenity. Have you given any thought to the marriage bed? We can tell that Lieutnant Beshelar has not, for otherwise he would have been aware that before long, he would see the empress in her nightshirt.” 

Beshelar blushed to the tips of his ears and bit his lower lip in an effort to make no sound. 

“Oh! That has not occurred to us, either. We beg your forgiveness, we should have considered that. And, in truth, we have not given much thought to it.” His ears flicked, unable to decide between fear and curiosity. “We admit that we have only the vaguest understanding of what we are to do in the wedding night. We had hoped our empress would be, ah, more knowledgeable, as she has, we imagine, married aunts she can ask.”

“It is that which would have most driven a young woman to commit suicide ... or, perhaps, seek some less moral way out.” Kiru stared at the bedside rug. Silver and golden flowers. 

„It … it cannot be that bad, surely?” Maia’s ears had pinned back against his head. “We had assumed ... due to our perusal of ... cheap novels, that it was, um, supposed to be enjoyable?”

“From what we gleaned from the things our patients have told us, it can be pleasant for women. If there is sufficient attraction. It is ... there is a difference, Serenity. Men require less attraction, we ... conclude from what we have heard.”

“Of course”, he mumbled. 

Behind him, Cala’s eyes went wide behind his glasses, and Beshelar was looking even more desperate to keep his composure than before. 

“We know the ... mechanics, so to speak, and admit we never found the thought appealing. We are glad there was an alternative to marriage for us.”

“Oh.” He followed her gaze, now also staring at the bedside rug.”We admit we had wondered. If it was your wish to become a cleric of Csaivo. We are glad that ... that this is what you wanted.” His ears drooped. “We are very sorry that apparently, Dach’osmin Ceredin did not get what she wanted. We had thought ... we had written a letter. We had promised her to be a good husband.”

“It is said that Varenechibel was very unkind to your Serenity’s mother, the Empress Chenelo, when he relegated her. However, we imagine she might have thought it a mercy. To not be summoned to his bedchamber anymore.” It pained her to hurt him so, but perhaps it would at least help him understand that this was not about him. 

“If this was the reason why – if it truly was Dach’osmin Ceredin who conspired against us, then ... do you think she would prefer the fate that was planned for us; the kinder fate of serving Cstheio, we mean, to a relegation that might still entail the ... risk of marriage?”

“You would not have her executed?“

“I can … we can hardly blame her, can we? We had foolishly assumed that ... that we were mistaken. That the horror felt by the pure maidens in those novels at the thought of ... defilement, was mere attachment to propriety. Or artistic exaggeration. We cannot hold it against her to want to escape such horror.”

He looked so lost and lonely she had to summon all her willpower to not stand up, walk to him and hug him.

She could ill afford to do that. Beshelar was already making strangled noises, no doubt trying to bite back the comments he wanted to make on how improper it was to even talk of such things. 

So, instead, she sipped on her now only lukewarm chocolate. “As we said, we never found the thought appealing. But we had assumed it is bearable. With a kind husband.”

“We had assumed, most women would want children, and endure marriage for that alone. It was so with our mother. She said, she did not regret her marriage to Varenechibel because it had brought her us.”

“We would have liked nieces and nephews, Serenity. We would have loved them the same as any child born to ourself.” Kiru swallowed. “It was ... not to be.“

“We are sorry to have reminded you of that.” 

“It was long ago.”


	13. Chapter 13

“We do wonder ...” Maia sighed. „We do wonder, because Dach’osmin Ceredin sent us a letter, shortly after our sister’s conspiracy against us came to light. We had thought that Dach’osmin Ceredin had come to like us, somewhat.”

Kiru knew only too well that writing a friendly letter was exactly what she would have done to dissipate any doubt of her loyalty – to be able to attack the easier. 

“We thought it sincere, as it differed in style from her first letter, in which she only spoke of duty. Maybe ... maybe if we show it to you, you could ... tell us if it is sincere? We are unschooled in the art of conversation and would not be able to see through any attempt to deceive us.”

“We can have a look at it, Serenity. We cannot promise, however, to derive from it any proof of Dach’osmin Ceredin’s innocence.” Which she thought was what he truly wanted. 

“Of course not. Still. We would like to know if we understood at least her alleged intentions?“ He walked to the nightstand, where apparently he had kept the letter for easy access. 

It was a much-read letter, Kiru saw at once. She scanned the contents. “Serenity.”

“We did misunderstand it, did we?”

“We are not sure we should be reading it.” Her ears twitched uneasily. “It is a love letter.“

„It is? We had thought it just … friendly? There is no impropriety in it?”

“Has your Serenity read many cheap novels?”

“We did not have that luxury often, no. We know that she must have drawn the inspiration for her signature from the cavaliers of Edrevanivar the Conqueror, but no more than that. We suppose that fighting duels is improper but ... this is not the kind of impropriety we meant?”

“Our sister liked such novels, and one particular genre, set in those days when duels were still considered honourable. It is just that ... the overall style of the letter, and the last part of it ... it extremely resembles a letter in which one such cavalier might offer his duty, loyalty and unending love to a lady of noble birth.” She cleared her throat. “Especially the offer to accomplish any service. A cavalier would usually have slain some foul beast, or an enemy of the lady, to prove his devotion.”

“Oh.” Had his face not been so dark, she was sure he would have blushed. “I had not known that.” His hands trembled as he took the letter back to the place where he had kept it, and apparently, would keep it in the future. “An we could be sure that she means it ...” 

 

“We admit that we cannot imagine this letter to be an attempt at deception, Serenity. It is exactly the kind of letter Dach’osmin Ceredin would write, according to what we have heard of her.” Kiru was not sure whether the lady’s family knew of her preference for rather masculine activities. The clerics of Csaivo had treated many an injury acquired in pastimes unbefitting a lady. There was gossip among them, but the unwritten rule was to be discreet when it came to outsiders. “The kind of letter she would write to someone she likes.”

Of course, it could still be deception. But … „We cannot believe, Serenity, that Dach’osmin Ceredin would dispel your distrust in such a clever way, and then proceed to be so stupid as to send servants in her family’s livery to bribe the laundry staff into poisoning you.”

“That was extremely stupid”, Maia agreed. “It seems that, at court, family bonds are not worth much? Could part of the family have conspired to get rid of me behind Csethiro’s back?” He want back to his armchair, now rather more relaxed. 

“Easily. There is, however, the question of why they would do so, now.”

There was a silence, broken by Beshelar’s timid voice. 

“Permission to speak, Serenity?”

“Certainly.“ The gaze of those big, hopeful eyes now rested on Beshelar. 

“We do not know much of court intrigues”, Beshelar admitted. “We have always been more interested in war strategies. And in war ... it is not unknown of, Serenity, to clothe armies in enemy uniforms, in order to deceive ... we do not wish to give false hope, but ...”

“Thank you!” Maia had listened with interest, and now seemed almost cheerful. “We shall have that investigated immediately. It should be easy to find out if the Ceredada employ a person that fits the description given.”

There was a knock at the door, and when his Serenity bade them enter, in strode Mer Aisava, followed by Telimezh. 

“We have made sure all the suspects that we know of are guarded, in such a way that they will not notice. We also have tapped all our sources of information.”

“We thank you. Did you find out anything?”

“There are some extremely alarming rumours about Dach’osmin Ceredin, Serenity.”

Maia sank back into his armchair, pulled his legs up and hugged them. Never had he looked more like a lost child. “What rumours? Speak freely.”

“Rumours that she carries on an affair with a commoner.”

“And what do the gossips base this rumour on? You know as well as anyone that rumours tend to be based on nothing but assumptions half of the time.”

“We know that, Athmaza. We tracked back the rumour to a laundress, who said there were suspicious stains on Dach’osmin Ceredin’s underwear. The laundresses have a reputation of knowing everything.”

“And rightly so. Our sources, however, say that there were stains on the underwear of some Ceredada woman, and that they were not suspicious, but plain yoghurt.” Kiru frowned. If Eivo had laundered the garment in question, then who else could have seen it, and come to wrong conclusions? “Which laundress?”

“We do not know.” Aisava’s ears flicked. “A laundress. She must have been new. There is another source that says Dach’osmin Ceredin was seen with a base-born man with goblin blood, and will try to pass of his child as the emperor’s” 

Maia sighed wearily. “What source?”

“The courier who told us that was convinced it must have been a servant of the Ceredada household, but could not remember a name. The woman was cloaked so he could not see any crest on her clothes, but he says he has seen the face somewhere.”

“And what does seen with mean? We were seen with Min Vechin, but nothing untoward happened.”

“Seen talking to in the gardens.”

“She might just have been giving the gardener instructions.” 

“Possibly, Serenity.”

“We must find out the identity of that Ceredada servant”, Kiru concluded. “There was a servant in Ceredada livery in the laundry, also.”

“We will have the guards put the whole family under arrest until more is found out.”

“Wait!”

Aisava glanced at the emperor. “Serenity?”

“Is that advisable? What if Beshelar is right, and this was an attempt to deceive us?”

“Of course, it is also possible that the Ceredada know we are too clever to believe they were so stupid to send their own servants, and did it intentionally to make us believe they were framed ...” Cala reflected. “On the other hand, for that they would have to rely on us being so clever in the first place ...”

Kiru rubbed her forehead. “One thing, Mer Aisava, We would have the laundry checked. Perhaps the poison was put onto the sheets there. Or just ... just summon some mazei and have them check the whole Alcethmeret.”

“Should we not first and foremost check the rooms of the Ceredada?”

“You should do that”, Edrehasivar agreed. “We believe it will be for the best if our enemies believe they have succeeded, if not in murdering us, then in framing the Ceredada. Kiru, as soon as you are recovered we would have you take a message to the sleeping chamber of Csethiro Ceredin. Ask her if she is willing to suffer, for our sake, the indignity of being arrested and lead to the Esthoramire by the guards. We would rather not insult her by inflicting this on her without warning.” 

Asiava was not convinced. “What if she is behind it all?”

“Then we will not have the advantage of having deceived our enemies, but will have succeeded nevertheless, as she will be imprisoned in any case.” 

“She should not be warned!”

“The guards can wait outside the Ceredeise apartments while we get the message there.We believe in Dach’osmin Ceredin’s innocence and are confident that she will agree to come. If she does not, we will agree to have her treated as suspect and imprisoned without her consent.” If she was correct in her estimation of Dach’osmin Ceredin’s character, then this would be easier by far than trying to take her against her will. 

 

Aisava swarmed out, and Kiru stood. “We should not exert ourselves before we have slept, but believe we are up to the task you have assigned us, Serenity.”

“Cala?” 

“We believe this to be true, Serenity. As long as she does nothing but walk and talk, she should be fine.”

“Good.”


	14. Chapter 14

They encountered nothing unusual on the way. Aisava must have done an admirable job of directing the guards to where they would not be noticed, or everyone would be on the hallways, wanting to see what was going on. 

At the door leading to the Ceredada apartments, the four guardsmen accompanying her stopped. 

Noble families did not lock their doors, it was safe for them. Kiru took a deep breath, extended a hand and opened the door. 

“Damn!”

Kiru stared. There was the very woman she had wanted to talk to. But Csethiro Ceredin was wearing clothes very much unbefitting a lady – namely, trousers and a shirt - and had a hood over her hair. Her face looked like it might have been darkened with charcoal. 

The guards drew their swords. 

Dach’osmin Ceredin’s hand twitched, but she did not put it on the hilt of the sword at her side. “We can explain this!”

Kiru nodded. “Let us go inside.” She turned to the guards. “Wait here.“

Inside the apartments, it was dark. “Your explanation, Dach’osmin.”

“We were on our way to dueling lessons. We surmise someone watched us and thought it a good idea to set the guards on us?”

“It is more complicated than that. Lead the way to your chambers, please”, Kiru whispered. “Your father, we assume, has no idea?”

“Naturally.”

Finally, they stood in the sleeping chamber and Dach’osmin Ceredin had lit a candle. “If this is not about our dueling lessons, then what is it about?”

Kiru looked her in the eyes. “His Serenity has been poisoned.”

The expression of shock on her face might have been faked, but she would have to be very good at it. “Is he ...?”

“He lives.”

Csethiro relaxed. “Good.“

„You remember, Dach’osmin, offering Edrehasivar your services? The time has come. Your emperor needs you.“

“We are ever at his service.” Csethiro gave a little bow. “Whatever he may need. Though we cannot imagine what it is we are asked to do. We are ready to fight a duel, but ...”

“This is not what is needed. Wash your face, Dach’osmin, and dress in something more appropriate. You will be dragged out of these apartments by the guards as soon as we command them so. His Serenity would prefer for you to be warm and comfortable.”

“Ah. We will be arrested for the attempt on his life, so that the true culprits will believe themselves safe?” Csethiro nodded. “We shall gladly play along. We believe we have a nightgown that fits the occasion.“

“There is no need to appear before the court in your nightgown.” 

“Do you want to catch them, or no? If it looks like we are taking a walk ... actually, why not drag us outside as we are? We look very suspicious.”

“We assume you will have to explain this to your father.“

“Ah, alright. Nightgown it is, then.“ Csethiro reached for a washcloth and poured some water into her washing bowl. “Though our teacher will know that we got to change our clothes … have you any traces? Or is everyone under suspicion?”

“We are afraid we can trust no one.”

“Then you should not trust us, you know?”

“We do not trust you, either. His Serenity, however, requested this course of action.”

“Ah. Good. For a moment, we were afraid you were letting your guard down. You would have had us arrested anyway, would you?” She dried her face with a towel. 

“Yes.”

“Naturally. We are pretty sure our teacher is not involved in anything of the sort, but it is not a risk that should be taken. Zhara Emirar is his name. Perhaps Lieutnant Telimezh can keep an eye on him? Just in case. He will be waiting for us in the gardens right now.“

„His absence might already have been noticed. We will talk to Captain Orthema.”

“Good. We thank you. Did we manage to clean ourself sufficiently?“

Kiru resisted the temptation to cast a maz to improve the light, and made do with the candle instead. “We do think so. No one will notice in the darkness. Hurry, you can just put your nightgown on over the other things.”

Csethiro insisted on removing the trousers and put them away carefully, but did put the nightgown on over her underclothes. “We sometimes sleep in those for warmth, so that is alright. The braid should work, too. Now, call the guards.”

 

Kiru had feared that Csethiro Ceredin would be too eager to play her part, and ruin it by overdoing the dramatics, but when the guards appeared in her chamber, she just stood there, her head held high. 

The rest of the household was not so quiet. 

Her father loudly demanded an explanation. 

“Fear not, ‘tis but a misunderstanding, it will be cleared up before sunrise”, Csethiro told him. “The emperor himself will come to unlock my chains.”

Alright, perhaps there was danger of overdone dramatics. 

All servants of the household would be questioned. Kiru left two guards there, and two accompanied her and her prisoner to the Esthoramire. 

“You aren’t taking us to the Nevennamire?”

“His Serenity explicitly ordered that you be brought to the Esthoramire.” And a good thing he had. She had indeed judged Csethiro’s character completely right, the girl had a taste for the dramatic, and might have insisted to be locked up in the dark and gloomy prison for those awaiting execution. 

The Esthoramire was uncomfortable enough in Kiru’s opinion. 

“Did you send one of your underskirts to the laundry by way of a servant recently?”

“We? No, not recently. We usually mostly require the service of a good needlewoman.”

Kiru nodded. She had expected that. 

„How is his Serenity?“, Csethiro asked quietly when they neared the Esthoramire. “You say he lives, but ...?”

“He is well.”

“We do not suppose he will visit us anytime soon?”

“He might.” It would be entirely expected for him to do so. After he had witnessed Dazhis’ revethvoran, it would only seem natural that he also visited his disgraced fianceé. 

“Please tell him that ... that we would like to see with our own eyes that he is well.”

“Of course.”


	15. Chapter 15

Dach’osmin Ceredin was treating it like a game, Kiru thought as she walked back to the Alcethmeret. Yet it was no game. The guards at the Esthoramire could probably be trusted, but what if not? 

 

As she had expected, Maia was delighted to hear that his cavalier had eagerly volunteered to provide whatever unusual kind of aid was needed. “And now”, he said with a stern gaze. “You should go to bed!”

“As should you, Serenity.” 

Beshelar’s ears twitched, but otherwise, he kept his composure at this show of gross presumption. 

 

When she woke up, she noticed, to her horror, that it was already late morning. She leapt out of bed and into her clothes. Why had she not been summoned? Sure, Telimezh couldn’t go fetch her himself, that’d be improper, but surely, he could have sent someone? 

When she arrived where she should have been hours before, Beshelar stood there as though it was still early in the morning.  
The only thing reassuring her that it was indeed as late as the bright sunshine indicated, was the frown on his face. “Has someone woken you up?” 

She was taken aback. Disapprovement she had expected, but it was not like Beshelar to be so venemous about it. 

“For some reason, Lieutnant Telimezh did not see fit to send someone when we did not appear for the change of shifts.” Only after that did it occur to her that, although he had had more free time, he could hardly have gotten more sleep than she had. It was not fair to blame him for this. “We apologize for our tardiness.”

“His Serenity gave orders to not disturb your sleep. You do not look like you are fit for duty, even now.”

Of course. Of course he would. Kiru wasn’t sure why she was even surprised anymore. 

“Why? We got sufficient rest.“

"Your overall appearance indicates that you are not fully awake.”

Kiru looked down on herself. Alright. She had her robe on the wrong way round. And probably her hair was not up to military standards, either. 

“We were in a hurry. If you will stay on duty for a while longer, we can make ourselves presentable.”

“We would prefer that.”

“Did anything happen during the night?” Had they done everything correctly?

“Mer Iva was arrested, and guards have been put in front of the Ceredada apartments. No one is allowed to get in or out. None of the servants matches the description given of the one who was seen in the kitchen and the laundry. You may want to ask the servant girl to look at them herself, though. We have delayed the questioning of Mer Iva until you are fit for duty, we felt you might have your own ideas on how to do it.”

“Is he guarded in such a way that he cannot commit suicide?”

“Of course.” Beshelar replied, indignantly. 

When she returned, Telimezh was already there, ready to relieve Beshelar. 

Inside the emperor’s bedchamber, the emperor was fully clothed, and in deep conversation with his secretary. 

“Ah, Kiru. We trust you are fully recovered?“

“We are, thank you, Serenity. Is there a reason why you chose to stay in here, other than making it easier for us to find you?”

“We thought it advisable to create some doubt as to how much our health was affected by the poisoning. Also, as we asked our first nohecharei to extend their shifts, we thought it reasonable to not leave the safety of those rooms. If you feel it is not an undue strain, perhaps we can now go to the Esthoramire and visit our fianceé?”

“It is not an undue strain. Though we would advise that your Serenity aspire to look less pleased about doing so.”

“Ah. Yes. We are afraid we will find that difficult. Perhaps we might suggest to first question Mer Iva, then? We will leave the specifics to you, Kiru.” 

 

That prospect was bleak enough to dampen his happiness, and when they set out towards the Esthoramire, the emperor’s ears were drooping appropriately. 

Questioning Iva was no challenge. The man was eager to help her investigations. He had received the poisoned sheets and nightshirt from a servant in Ceredada livery, who had threatened to expose Iva’s gambling habit, and offered to settle all debts if he complied. 

“Thou fool! Thou wouldst never have been allowed to keep thy position! They would have killed thee as soon as the plot was completed! Thinkst they did not know thou wouldst betray the new emperor as readily as the old one?”

Iva stared at his feet. “We did not think so far.”

“Pray to Cstheio to give thee more brains, then!”, she snapped. Sleeping through half the morning had done nothing to alleviate the effect the events of the night had had on her mood. 

“It is rather too late for that, Athmaza. Now, he can only pray to Ulis to grant him a painless death”, one of the armed men guarding the prisoner said. 

“Ah. About that.” Maia interrupted. „We should prefer to spare his life.”

“Serenity?!” Of all those present, Iva seemed to be most shocked. 

“While his cowardice is deplorable, we feel that a difference ought to be made between those who wish to be rid of us, and those who act as their accomplices out of fear. As someone told us recently, it matters little what the crime in question was if the end result is death in any case.”

“Shall we leave him to rot in the Nevennamire, then?”

“We will discuss the matter with our advisors. We feel that leaving him to rot would rather defeat the purpose of sparing his life”, Maia replied. “Keep him here for the time being. We would now like to speak to Dach’osmin Ceredin. Can we see her in her cell? We would grant her the dignity of not being dragged around by the guards.”

The guards made to lead the prisoner away, but he resisted. 

“Serenity.” Iva knelt, and looked as though he would have prostrated himself had his chains allowed this. “There is something we would tell you.”

Kiru instinctively stepped between him and her charge. This sudden change of mind might be sincere, but might also be a trick. 

Maia took a step back. “We are listening.”

“We said we spoke to a woman in Ceredada livery. That is true, but ... we have a feeling that we have seen her in different livery before. The Dach’osmin Ceredin might be innocent.” 

The emperor’s ears flicked forward. “In which livery?”

„We cannot remember. Which is why we did not mention it before. We are sorry. It must have been a long time ago, and we have never talked to her before.”

“Ah. Well then, let us know if you remember at some later point.”

Without waiting for the guards to answer his question. Edrehasivar turned to walk through the Esthoramire. Before long, a guard scurried after them and directed them to the cell wherein Dach’osmin Ceredin was being held. 

Her cell contained not only a bed, but also a chest for clothes, and a writing desk at which she was sitting, apparently busy composing a letter, when the guard opened the cell. 

She jumped from her seat, not even attempting to disguise her pleasure at the sight. “Serenity, we are honoured.” She made a deep curtsey. “We knew, of course, that this misunderstanding would be cleared, yet we dared not hope you would free us yourself.”

“Actually”, Maia’s ears drooped. “Nothing is clear as of now. We have come to, ah, question you.”

“Of course.” Csethiro was unfazed. “We would offer you a seat, yet we surmise your nohecharei would not allow it. 

“It would be unwise to enter the cell”, Kiru agreed. 

“We wondered whether there are any servants of your family that are not on your father’s payroll?”

“None that we know of.”

“A servant in Ceredada livery play a vital role in this conspiracy, yet no one seems to know her”, Kiru explained. “Are you sure you do not remember any? Perhaps some that changed employers?”

“Our father pays decently. We cannot recall that any servant has left our family’s service in the past few years. In fact, when our favourite maidservant declared her intention to marry, we managed to persuade her to remain in our service and set up her family home nearby our favourite estate.” 

"So there is no way someone not loyal to your family could wear the livery of your servants?” Kiru asked. 

“It is not a signet. We imagine it might easily be imitated if one was such inclined.” Csethiro frowned. “Very easily indeed. It was careless of us to not give more thought to that, considering recent events. However, we think it might prove fruitful to find out who recently purchased the materials used.”

“We will ask Csevet.” Maia smiled. „Perhaps we can clear your name soon.“

“If it takes longer, that is no matter, Serenity.” She extended a hand, slowly enough for Kiru to not see any danger in it. Perhaps she would ask for some token of his favour?

And then Maia gave her his hand and she lifted it to her lips and kissed it. 

Kiru watched without blinking, preparing to intervene any moment should there be a sudden movement. “Serenity. We think you should not take such a risk. We have not searched her for hidden weapons.”

“You have not? We admit we are surprised.” 

“We would appreciate being told in advance if your Serenity intends to do anything reckless.”

“Of course. We will try to do that.”


	16. Chapter 16

When they were out in the open again, Edrehasivar suggested to go about his usual daily routine as to not alert the conspirators to the fact that investigations were still in progress. “We would usually visit our mother’s tomb.”

There was nothing to be said against that – in fact, it would perhaps change his mood sufficiently so that he did look like someone who had been betrayed by his fianceé and was preparing for her execution. Or, rather, like Maia would look if that happened. There were certainly many emperors who would not have cared at all. 

 

When they approached the tomb, Telimezh suddenly said: “Wait!”

Kiru scanned the surroundings. There seemed to be no danger. “What is it?”

“We recall that you paid attention to all irregularities, and were right to do so. There is a flower on Chenelo Zhasan’s tomb.”

Indeed, a single blue lily blossom, crudely fashioned from the fabric of a maza’s robe lay there. “It is no danger, Lieutnant.”

“The flower perhaps not, but who placed it there?”

“We did. Therefore, we know it to be harmless.”

Maia turned to look at her. “Did you know my mother?”

“We never had occasion to talk to the Empress Chenelo. However, we did often see her. We have been very impressed by her piety, and by the kindness we knew her to possess because people talked about it.”

“Some people had something nice to say about her? We are pleased to know this.” 

“Serenity. The court is ... the court, and as such, heavily influenced by the opinions of its emperor. You must have noticed that those who serve the gods are ... more independent.”

“Yes. We have noted that. Still, we are pleasantly surprised. And we are ... touched.”

For a moment, she thought there were tears shining in his eyes, but then he turned away, and she stayed behind to stand guard while he stood at his mother’s grave. 

 

The laundress who had spread the slanderous rumours about Dach’osmin Ceredin remained unfindable. The courier who had talked to her was led to the laundry, and could not identify her among the women, and was rather sure she was not among them. 

 

In the afternoon, Edrehasivar asked for a change of shifts for the nohecharei, and ordered Kiru to go to bed and sleep some more. “We have given up on finding out any more today, and would prefer for you to be fully rested when any new matters come to light. Cala told us that, while your physical health is restored by a night of sleep, you might not be able to save us again should another such emergency arise.”

“We could, Serenity, but only by sacrificing our life.” Kiru bowed. “We thank you for your consideration.”

Sleep would come soon, as the body instinctively sought to restore the mazeise powers. Her only worry was for Telimezh, who might not yet be able to sleep and as result not be rested for the night shift. 

 

He noticed her concerned gaze and shook his head. “It was an eventful night. We are sure we will be able to sleep.”

“We imagine you might not want to have a sleeping maz cast on you anytime soon, but ... the offer stands.”

Telimezh smiled wearily, his ears drooped. “Thank you, but no.”

 

Kiru woke after exactly six hours of sleep, just as she had intended. 

 

When she arrived, the emperor had eaten and was getting ready for bed. 

Cala greeted her with a bit too much relief for her liking. “Csoru Zhasanai demanded an audience this afternoon, and his Serenity was so weary he granted it. He has not yet recovered from it.”

“Oh dear.” Kiru sighed. Could the annoying woman not have written a letter, which would have been bad enough? „What did she want this time?”

“To express her sympathy regarding the betrayal of the Ceredada. She went so far as to offer her assistance in finding him a new empress.”

“I greatly look forward to witnessing her disappointment.” 

“Perhaps we ought to ask his Serenity to have her letters read and replied by Mer Aisava, and not look at them himself”, Cala replied, speaking in the plural to include Kiru. “I find they constitute an attack on his spirit, from which we ought to protect him.”

“That argument is not without merit.” Kiru grinned. “I will try to bring it up with his Serenity.”

 

His Serenity was, as Cala had warned, in a dark mood. 

“She had the gall to remind us that she is, technically, our stepmother”, he said quietly. “Implying that we should look up to her as we did to our mother! It ... galls us, which we are sure was her intention.”

“We do not doubt it, Serenity.”

“We told her that we would rather ask Arbelan Zhasanai for advice.”

Kiru chuckled. “Arbelan Zhasanai? You used these exact words, Serenity?“ 

“We did. We know it is not wise, politically, to acknowledge Arbelan as widow of our father, but it had the desired effect.” His grin was weary. “It still ... grates on our nerves, to see the memory of our mother thus sullied.“

Some might think it an affront to Chenelo Zhasan to acknowledge her predecessor as lawful widow, but Kiru was sure Chenelo did not care about such things. “We have talked to Cala. We both think it advisable to deny Csoru Zhasanai access to your person, whether by letter or audience. It is our task to guard your spirit, Serenity.”

“Oh. Yes. That would … would be justified, would it? But we would not like for her to think she has succeeded in her efforts to ... hurt us.”

“We understand, Serenity. Perhaps we can consider it when she has returned to writing only her usual annoying letters.”

There was a silence. Kiru looked around in the room, checked the windows, and settled into a comfortable position. 

“We do not wish to pry, but ... we should like to know why you visited our mother’s tomb at this time, many years after her death?”

“Serenity.” There was no point in lying. On the other hand, it was difficult to explain, to even know the truth. “We are not sure ourselves. We felt a ... a rather silly need to ... reassure Chenelo Zhasan that we would … watch over her son. Although we had already sworn an oath to do so.” Put like that, it sounded, indeed, very silly. 

Maia did not answer immediately. “I am glad”, he finally said. “That you will not only watch over Edrehasivar VII, but also over Maia, son of Chenelo.”

“Serenity.”

There was nothing else that could be said. Even without Beshelar there to disapprove, there were boundaries one did not cross.  
Even if, perhaps, one had already crossed them in one’s heart.


	17. Chapter 17

It was in the small hours of the morning, that there was a forceful knock at the door to the antechamber. It was the signal for some urgent business that was probably no threat. 

Maia sat up and yawned. “There is someone at the door.”

“Shall we allow them to enter, Serenity?”

“Yes, please. It must be important.”

The visitor was Mer Aisava. 

“A message from the Esthoramire. Iva remembered the answer to your question. It is Drazhada.”

“What?!”

“We know that this is rather inconclusive, but surmise he felt a need to encode the information. Does this refer to some previous conversation?”

The livery in which the suspicious servant had been seen before.

“Thank you, Csevet. We remember.“ Maia sighed. „We had hoped to not be betrayed, again, by our own family.”

“Iva is not a trustworthy source.”

“We believe that he might be reliable in this case.”

“Well. There is one good thing in this, at least. Mer Aisava, as his Serenity’s nohecharo, we ask that all correspondence from Csoru Zhasanai will be read and answered by you, and that his Serenity will not even be informed of the contents. We can now consider this a reasonable precaution.” 

Aisava tried very hard to keep the smile from his face, but did not wholly succeed. “Of course, Athmaza. May we also suggest to have her put in the Esthoramire as part of those reasonable precautions. His Serenity’s safety is above all other considerations.”

“Make sure that her servants are also guarded for questioning. As should be all other servants of the Drazhada.” Satisfying as it was to have a reason to have Csoru imprisoned, they had still not caught the conspirators. 

“Csevet, would you fetch our edocharei? We feel we should talk to our nieces and nephew.”

In theory, Idra was old enough to be involved. On the other hand, his thwarting the previous attempt to dethrone Edrehasivar was rather reliable proof that he would not involve himself in any other conspiracy. 

Which of course did not mean someone might not plan to use him. Or, perhaps, murder him. To whom would the throne go if Maia and Idra both died? Was not Setheris Nelar somehow related to the family? But his servants would not wear the Drazhada livery. 

Maia’s sister Vedero was a very unlikely suspect. Left ... only Csoru. Wasn’t she a friend of Csethiro Ceredin? 

 

“They will be still asleep at this hour, Serenity. We do not believe it necessary to disturb them.” Aisava said. “And you should rest, too.”

“There should be guards at the entrance to their rooms, Mer Aisava.” Though there likely would be no attempt on Idra’s life after the failed plot, one could never be too cautious. “And the longer we think about it, the more advisable it seems to put Csoru Zhasanai in chains. Vedero Drazhin is also a possible suspect, though we cannot think of a motive.” Arbelan Drazharan, though also of the house Drazhada, had returned to court only so recently that she could have no connections to the servant. And she, more than anyone else, lacked a motive. 

“We cannot afford to treat them differently”, Edrehasivar agreed. “Nevertheless, we would like to write a short letter to Vedero to explain things. And, perhaps, Kiru, if you would ... we feel it would be unkind to send male guards to her bedroom. We trust you would be able to defend yourself?”

“We are confident.”

 

In the end, it was not necessary for Kiru or anyone to enter Vedero’s bedroom, for the simple reason that she was outside watching the stars. She read Maia’s letter, nodded, and followed the guards without any attempt to escape. 

Kiru was not present when the guards took Csoru, but could hear the screaming when they neared the Esthoramire. 

“Poor Csoru.” Vedero’s ears twitched with amusement. „She was so smug when Csethiro was arrested … by the way, is Csethiro cleared now?”

“It is still being investigated.”

 

Before sunrise, Csoru’s most loyal servant had been confirmed to have been the one to bribe Iva and spread the rumours. 

Kiru was sent to bed by the emperor after that, so she had to ask Cala for the details. Apparently, Csoru had hoped to use her legal position as the children’s grand-stepmother to influence Idra. 

Framing Csethiro, it appeared, had just been an added bonus – the women were friends, apparently, only in name, having had the friendship forced on them by their fathers while in fact, they hated each other. 

“His Serenity feels sorely tempted to relegate her to Edonomee.”

, Cala related.

“Surely, the place is not that bad? I understand that his Serenity was mistreated by his cousin, but without that ... it is very lonely, no doubt, but ...”

“To Csoru, it would be hell. Introducing new fashions at court seems to be her favoured pastime.”

“Well. She should have thought of that before”, Kiru replied grimly. “I, for one, do not pity her in the slightest.”

“Nor do I. But his Serenity will likely resist the temptation and send her to some nicer place. Thou knowst how he is.”

“I hope he will consider any relegation to any place, horrible though it may be, a good compromise. The appropriate punishment would be death.”

“She is Zhasanai. He will be able to spare her.“


	18. Chapter 18

The next few days were uneventful, allowing Kiru to visit her sister’s grave and to brief her fellow nohecharei on exactly which things needed to be tested for poison. 

With Cala and Beshelar this was most difficult, as she had to talk to them while they guarded the antechamber to his Serenity’s bedchamber, each in turn. 

“Candles?” Cala frowned. „I do not doubt thine expertise, but ...“

“A wick can be soaked in a poison that will then be released while the candle burns.”

He shuddered. “Fascinating. Yet were I not so certain of thy loyalty to our emperor, I should fear thee as the most likely person to succeed in his assassination.“

If only she had had the chance with the previous emperor ... 

“Kiru? Thou scarest me“. 

She shook her head. It was over. „Needst not worry. Edrehasivar is safe with me.”

“That, I do not doubt. Yet ... Kiru, for a moment there was murder in thine eye.”

“Fear not. ‘tis but a memory.”

“I knew not that thy past was so bleak ...” Suddenly, there was a shocked expression on Cala’s face and his ears pinned back. “Is this about thy sister? She died not by accident, did she?”

“No. Not by accident.”

“Yet thou hast become an orphan so early ... She cannot have been forced into marriage ...”

“Not marriage, no.”

For a moment, there was a confused expression on Cala’s face. But he was a maza, what he lacked in experience, he had made up for in reading. “Oh.” His eyes grew wide. „Then … oh Kiru, I am so sorry.“

„I would have avenged her. It was not to be.”

Cala raised a hand, and when she did not step away, touched her shoulder gently. “Perhaps vengeance would not have tasted as sweet as thou had’st thought.”

“Perhaps not.“

 

The next night shift was for the second nohecharei. 

“We would talk to you, Kiru”, Maia said as he walked to his chambers. “Will you guard us tonight?”

“Serenity.” She bowed. There was no question as to whether she would guard, but she well understood what he meant, and told Telimezh that she would stand watch inside. 

 

When the edocharei had left, Maia sat up in his bed. “We have thought”, he said cautiously. “About your sister.”

“Serenity. There is no need. She has been dead for many years.”

“So has our mother.” He paused. „We are sorry for your loss.“

“Serenity.”

“We would talk of her, an it does not pain you too much.”

She dipped her head. “Serenity.”

“We gather she was not a cleric of Csaivo?”

“No. She was a servant here.” Kiru swallowed. 

“From what you told us, we surmise that she ... might have been forced into a marriage?”

“Not marriage, Serenity.” 

“Something worse, then.” His ears drooped. „Can we do anything to ease your pain?”

Kiru stared at her feet. “Nothing more than you have already, Serenity.” The bedside rug caught her eye. “Or perhaps ...”

“Yes?”

“This bedside rug is repugnant. With your permission, we shall have it burnt.”

Maia’s ears flicked. “There is more to this than you tell us. But we will not pry. Do get rid of the rug, we are not attached to it. We are sure something can be found to replace it.”

“Thank you, Serenity.”

 

She burnt it in the fireplace of the Tortoise Room the very next day.


	19. Chapter 19

When his Serenity went outside to greet his grandfather, Kiru was watchful.

She did, however, also find the time to advise Maia to wave to the masses. 

As the crowd cheered, Kiru kept her eyes firmly on all the places from where an arrow could be shot. The walls of the palace were designed like a fortress, and the small windows lent themselves were well to concealing archers. 

An irregularity at the edge of her vision drew her attention, then everything happened very fast. 

She raised a hand intuitively, and only registered afterwards that what she had seen was an archer on one of the towers she had been watching. 

“Kiru!“ 

„We are fine, Serenity.“ The arrow stuck in her hand was an inconvenience, but could surely be dealt with. 

Telimezh had the good sense to usher Maia behind her and shield him with his own body on the other side. 

The guards nocked arrows to their bows, but it was too late, the archer had vanished from sight already. 

“Retreat! Now!”

 

When the large gates had closed behind them, she eyed her hand. The arrow had gone halfway through. She would have to cut one of the ends off to pull it out. Though perhaps it would be better to let it be where it was for the time being. 

“Our nohecharo needs a doctor. And send for the Adremaza”, Edrehasivar calmly ordered. “We need someone who can heal this.”

Kiru kept her eyes on him and did not notice much else until she was placed in a soft armchair. Her wounded hand, she noticed belatedly, was encased in two grey ones. Already her blood had stained the emperor’s white sleeve. 

“Will you recover?” 

“We are confident we will.” The arrow had likely splintered her bone, as it would have gone through more smoothly had that not been the case. But provided that all splinters of bone were removed, there was a maz that could heal it. “Though of course, it is possible that the arrow is poisoned. Take care to not touch the arrowhead, Serenity.”

“Poison! Do you feel alright?”

Did she? “Right now, we do, but the poison will not have had much time to spread.” She put her right hand on the arm with the wounded hand and closed it around the wrist, to limit the bloodflow. “Our pulse should be slowed down. We fear we cannot summon the focus necessary to achieve this.”

The doctor arrived first.

“We would usually suggest amputation as the easiest remedy ...”

“No!” Maia exclaimed. „That is – Kiru – do you wish to have it so? For fear of poison? We would save your hand, but the decision is for you to make.“

“We are nohecharo. It is our duty to serve the emperor to the best of our ability. We believe the risk of poison does not justify amputation. Remove the feathered end with a saw and pull the arrow out. We will instruct you on how to proceed, if it is needed.”

“Yes. Yes, of course. First, we should give you something against the pain.”

“No. If the arrow was poisoned, we do not know how any of the usual pain remedies will affect the poison. It might worsen its effects. We can try to cast a maz ...” First, though, she should do something against possible poison. 

It took her three attempts. 

“Do you now feel no pain?”

“We merely slowed down our pulse. Proceed. We can bear the pain.” She bit her teeth together. She could bear the pain, worsen as it did. She must. 

Sawing off the arrow’s end took some time. When the doctor was ready to pull it out, the Adremaza had arrived and cast a maz to numb the pain. 

“Thank you. May we suggest to improve our liver function? And test for poison.”

There were only a handful of substances that had any business in being on an arrowhead, so that did not take long. 

“It is poisoned. Not wolfsbane, which is a relief. However, we could not identify the poison.”

Damn! She could not die, she had things to do!

Already she felt a dizzyness that could only be caused by the poison. “Make sure there are no stray bone splinters before a healing maz is cast. That is the main thing. We will able to regrow missing bone, but bone where it has no business being will obstruct the movement. In short, make sure everything is where it is ...” Her tongue felt heavy and weary. 

 

“The Great Avar has arrived!”

That was the last thing Kiru heard before everything went black.


	20. Chapter 20

She walked in darkness. Every now and then, the light of imperial white would be seen, and she knew where she went. 

Her sister walked with her, a rotting corpse. “Dost know what he did to me? Canst imagine the pain?” In her half-rotten womb an ugly worm squirmed, trying to get out. 

Kiru could not, could only know that it was worse than anything she might imagine. She was cold, so cold. “I love thee”, she said, yet she felt only emptyness where her heart would be. Empty and cold. “And I shall avenge thee.”

Now there was heat in her heart, the feverish heat of righteous anger. “I shall plan, and I shall wait. I shall become his closest, his most trusted. I shall become nohecharis. And a dagger shall find his throat, and his blood shall spill on those silver and golden flowers. He will not see it coming. Sister mine, this I pledge, I shall avenge thee. Be it steel, be it poison, or a revethmaz, Nemera Drazhar shall die by my hand.”

When she looked again, she could not see her sister. And then she knew her eyes were closed. She must open them. 

Her gaze met widened eyes the colour of rainclouds. 

And it all came back. She had spoken aloud. And he knew ... he knew. She was as good as dead. 

Perhaps the poison would have been less painful than revethvoran. 

A grey hand wrung the water out of a white cloth. Wiped the sweat off Kiru’s forehead. 

“The unintellegible muttering of a fever patient”, Edrehasivar said. “We have not understood a word.” A cool hand brushed the wet hair from her face. “Have you?” There was steel in his voice. 

„Serenity. We are afraid we paid no attention whatsoever. We were distracted by checking her pulse.” The voice sounded familiar. Eishoran? Had they fetched a fellow cleric to tend to her? 

“Serenity, we stand behind you. An you have not understood a word, how could we?” Cala. Dear Cala. 

“We would not presume to have a keener ear for words than a Dachen’maza”, Beshelar said stiffly. 

“Of course. Kiru, how do you feel?”

“Reasonably well, Serenity.” Her tongue formed the words with no difficulty at all. So much for unintellgible. 

“We are glad. You have been unconscious for days.”

Days? “We are sorry, Serenity.”

“What for? Saving our life? How is your hand? Can you move it?”

It took her a moment to remember. The arrow, of course. She stretched her left hand, made a fist, relaxed. “We notice no impairment. We can return to our duties in a few hours, we think.”

“Tomorrow is early enough. Though we admit we are glad to have you back.”

She was keenly aware that his hand still rested on her forehead. “Serenity.”

“The Adremaza has acted as your replacement himself. We admit we are not entirely comfortable with that.”

She could well imagine. „Has any progress been made in identifying the attacker?”

“Not much. Csevet made a list of the guardsmen who were with us, and is currently working on one of all those known to be competent enough archers to do this kind of thing, but ... there’s too many. Do you have any suspicions?”

“None at all, yet. We only got a glimpse of the archer ... a white face under a hood. That might narrow it down a bit. Could the poison be identified?”

“Yes. That is why we could give you the antidote. We are glad it worked.” He withdrew his hand. “We should leave now; it is late.”

Kiru noticed that he had not told her the name of the poison.


	21. Chapter 21

The nightmares did not return. Eishoran gave her something to drink and ordered a light meal from the kitchens. 

In the evening, Kiru could sit up and talk. 

As it turned out, there were still rumours about Csethiro Ceredin. They always had to treat her for the odd cut or severe bruise after having been called upon to treat a most ladylike headache. 

“She will be good for him”, Eishoran said after relating this. 

“Yes. I think so, too.”

“It was very kind of him to ...” Of course, she could not say it. It could never be spoken of. 

“Yes, very. He does deserve happiness.” Kiru paused. Eishoran had not known – no one had known. „Dost hate me now?“

„What?“

„Because I …“

„I had my suspicions. And it is well thou never hadst the chance.”

Their conversation was interrupted by a knock at the door. 

Lieutenant Telimezh sat down in a chair in the corner of the room. “We are pleased to find you well. And ... we must thank you for your quick reaction. Had it been left to us, we would have failed His Serenity again.”

“There is nothing you could have done against betrayal.”

“Yet we should have been the one to take the arrow. A soldier is easily replaced. A dachenmaza is not.”

“You are way younger than us. It is only natural you would not have thought of everything.”

He sighed. “Age alone cannot account for this, unless you imply that something similar happened in your lifetime?”

“We have read books. Which we know is not part of a soldier’s training. Do not worry about it. Is it your wish that we push you in the way of harm next time?”

“Taking into consideration our respective bulk, it would be wiser to push his Serenity behind us. We do think he would forgive you.”

“We think that too. We will try to remember.” She smiled wearily. “We do hope that there will be no next time.”

“We hope that, too.”

 

When Kiru reported for duty the next morning, His Serenity was already at work, reading letters, no doubt from all nobles wishing to reassure him of their loyalty. As she had asked he wore gloves for this. 

She exchanged places with Cala with only a nod for greeting. They would talk later. 

After going through all the correspondence that could not possibly wait, His Serenity rose. “We would like to to go the Chapel of All Gods”, he said. “But we do not think it would be wise to go anywhere near where an archer might be hidden?”

“They will not try the same method a second time”, Kiru replied. “That is, we think they would not. It would be predictable. And we can cast a maz to slow down arrows, provided we know which direction the danger is to be expected from. This requires a lot of concentration, but we had plenty time to rest.” She hesitated “We would like to allow you this small freedom, Serenity.”

Maia sighed. “Much as we would like to have it, we also wish to keep you safe.”

“We will not fail you this time, Serenity.” Telimezh stated stiffly. 

“You know that we do not want you to get hurt any more than Kiru.” 

“Nevertheless. We, too, do not believe the next attack will be done in the same way. And should we go right now, no one will have time to prepare an attack.”

That convinced Maia, and they set out for the chapel. 

 

When they stepped inside, Kiru allowed herself to relax. The stained glass windows would prevent anyone from aiming at His Serenity. 

“Can we ask you to guard the door?” 

“Yes, Serenity.“ Telimezh turned and went outside. 

 

„We admit … we have long wanted to meditate, but felt … felt our nohecharei would ... would think ... less of us?”

“Serenity. We would never ...” The concept of it was alien to her. She knew, of course, that piety was not fashionable at court. Yet that someone should be so frightened ... 

“Well. Of course not.” He gave her a helpless smile. “Not you, in any case. We heard what you said about our mother and we have allowed ourself to hope ...”

“Serenity. We are confident Cala would not think less of you. And concerning the good opinion of your other nohecharei ... we do think Lieutnant Beshelar was more shocked by your actions yesterday than he is likely to ever be again.”

“Ah, that. In the moment, there was no alternative.”

“Serenity.” Of course there had been.

„We would ask you one thing, though.”

“Serenity?“

„Did you get to keep your promise to your sister?”

She flinched. Did he truly think her capable of killing the entire crew of an airship? Just for revenge? “No. We did not. And never will. We assume this must be the reason why we had a nightmare about it.“

“We can see that it pains you. Please remember that it is not your fault.” With that, he turned away and paced the chapel until he had found a place that seemed to please him. 

There, he sat down and started to pray. Or meditate, as he called it, though it was clearly a prayer, although a strangely repetitive one. 

It was easy, Kiru observed, to lose oneself in that prayer, and while that was likely the purpose of it, witnessing it and staying watchful at the same time, was strenous. 

 

At last Maia stood up again, and when he turned to her, Kiru could not help but notice a newfound peace on his features. “We thank you.”

“Serenity. It is our duty.”

“Nevertheless, we thank you.” He looked at her. “We trust you. And therefore, we wish to tell you, that the poison you were affected by is one that was, apparently, a by-product of the research done by one of the more scholarly inclined ladies in the circle of our sister Vedero.”

“Serenity.“

„It was for this reason that she knew of an antidote. This is most alarming, and ... we want you to know it. Though we could not say that in front of any outsider, not even one who we gathered is your friend.”

“We understand that and thank you.” Those ladies had no motive at all, and were unlikely to be involved in any conspiracy, but of course, were it to be known, there would be rumours.


	22. Chapter 22

The investigations still had not led anyhwere when Maia celebrated his birthday. Kiru was on duty that morning, to her great delight. 

Maia seemed to like the new bedside rug, which depicted a suncat. It was almost something befitting an emperor. Kiru had spent a good part of her savings on it. Savings she would no longer need to buy poison and silence. 

The breakfast Maia shared with his young relatives was so pleasant that Kiru was almost lulled into a relaxing on duty. 

Almost. 

She kept an eye on Telimezh and, when they finally were relatively alone – that was, guarding while Maia penned a letter to Csethiro Ceredin – she turned to her partner. 

“Is there something wrong, Lieutenant? You have been holding your hands the same way since the morning.”

“Our hands are fine, thank you, Athmaza.”

“We are sure they are, Lieutenant, and had we previously gotten the impression that you find us attractive, we would not ask any more questions. However ...” She pointedly looked at where his hands were folded over his lap. 

“It is not like that!”

“We already surmised that.”

Now, Maia raised his head. “Is there something wrong, Kiru?”

“Nothing that would be of concern to you, Serenity”, Telimezh hastened to assure. 

“Well. An you say so.” Maia turned back to his letter. 

 

“Well?”

“We had hoped you would not notice”, Telimezh admitted. 

“Ah, but we have. And we have been a cleric of Csaivo long enough to have some idea what it is about.”

“Please!” Telimezh squeaked. „It is not what you think it is!”

Kiru put a hand on his arm. “You have no idea what we think it is. We think it might be caused by some obscure poison.”

“Oh.” He blinked. „We were, indeed, bitten by a spider. When we, ah, used the privy. It must somehow have come from our sleeve. We decided to not make a fuss about it.”

“After you searched, as we asked of you, the silks given to His Serenity by the Tethimada for anything suspicious?”

“After that, yes. Oh. Oh!“ His eyes went wide with shock. 

Maia turned around. „So this is, in fact, of concern to us?“

„We do believe it is, Serenity”, Kiru replied grimly. “Lieutenant, have you killed that spider?”

“Yes.”

“Do you still have the body?”

“No. We are sorry, we did not –“

“That makes things more difficult, but we do believe the condition the poison left you with can be treated.”

Changing shifts at that moment would have been unwise, as Cala and Beshelar had just gone to bed after a night shift some hours ago, but His Serenity was kind enough to stay in his bedchamber while a doctor treated Telimezh in the antechamber, thus ensuring they all were in their respective places. 

Of course, there were additional guards at the door leading to the emperor’s rooms. Kiru would not risk Telimezh having to fight with his trousers down. 

“Why did he not tell us?” Maia asked, puzzled. 

“The effect of that poison is a bit embarrassing, Serenity. Though no less dangerous because of it.”

“We suppose it is, but ... he has admitted it is very painful, too.”

“He already failed you once, Serenity. In his own opinion.” Or twice even. “We hope he feels better now, though we suppose it is not quite as glamorous as taking a poisoned arrow for you.”

“All the more grateful are we that the spider did not reach us.” Maia stared at the door behind which they hoped the doctor was successfully treating that most embarrassing affliction. He had been confident that the application of leeches would be successful. “Though it does seem a rather inefficient method of assassination. Could it have been coincidence?”

“Spiders sometimes do get into silk shipments. However, it would be unwise to trust the Tethimada.” She paused. “Of course, it would be unwise to trust the Tethimada, anyway. Ever since Mer Aisava told you why he dislikes Eshevis Tethimar, we have formed an opinion on the man.”

“So have we. While we do not think his crimes are proof that he will try to assassinate us, they do speak of a deplorable personality. An it suits his goals, he will surely not hesitate to murder anyone.” Maia frowned. “We have thought of Csevet’s tale a lot, recently. Forgive us if we sound ignorant, but ... what Tethimar planned to do Csevet ... was it ...?”

“Not so dissimilar to what Tethimar will do to his bride in the wedding night, and every time after? We believe so, Serenity.” She had suspected, then, that he did not quite understand. 

“We find we dread our own wedding night more and more.“

“Dach’osmin Ceredin has shown you great favour.”

“She has and we look forward to spending more time with her, but we dread the mere thought of causing her pain. Or even discomfort.“

“Serenity. Perhaps we should not have spoken of … perhaps we should not have given the impression that ...” 

“We are glad you feel able to be honest with us.”

“Even so. We did say that the, uh, duties of the marriage bed can pleasant for a woman.”

“With sufficient attraction, you said.“ Maia looked down, his ears drooped. “We fear are not attractive in any way. And we lack ... experience.”

“We are confident that consideration will make up for the lack of experience, Serenity.” She hesitated. “We also got the impression that Dach’osmin Ceredin does find you attractive.”

“Well. Yes. I do look very white and sparkly in those garments.” He looked at his hand as though it were a venomous spider. “Without them, my skin colour is ... no, forgive us. We should not ...”

“It is true that it is not our place to comment on your looks, Serenity.” Though it pained her to see him so unhappy. “We would, however, advise you to remember that it was not Setheris Nelar’s place, either.” Cala had, in strict confidence, told her both what he knew, and suspected to have happened at Edonomee. 

Maia looked at her for a long time. “That is true. Still. We feel we cannot disregard one of the few honest opinions we have ever heard.“

 

A knock at the door alerted them to the fact that the doctor was finished with Telimezh’s treatment. 

They went outside and Kiru cast a healing maz on the pink-faced Lieutenant. 

“Better?”

“We are. Thank you.” He smoothed his clothes. „Also, thank you for noticing. The doctor told us the damage would have been irreversible had we waited until the end of our shift.“

“Next time you have an embarrassing health problem, just claim to have an headache and find a doctor. Everyone does it.”

“They do?”

“Noble ladies only ever have headaches or fainting spells. Or at least that is what we are told by those who summon us to their bedsides.” Kiru winked. “The clerics of Csaivo do not gossip.” Not with anyone not a fellow cleric, at least. 

“Ah. Thank you. We shall do that … but please do remember that we could, in fact, have a headache.”

“Of course.”

Maia’s ears had twitched in amusement during the exchange. Now he stepped forward. “You have our heartfelt gratitude for saving us from that spider. Words cannot express how relieved we are this did not happen to us.”

Telimezh’s blush returned, but his ears were relaxed this time. “It is our duty, Serenity.”

“And we thank you for doing it. Especially since we suspect your duty would not be as dangerous with a more popular emperor.” 

“It could have been an accident, in this case.”

“Perhaps, but then, perhaps not.”


	23. Chapter 23

Later that day, the Great Avar had the cheek to suggest a visit to the horse market. Kiru noticed how eager he was to be affable with his grandson, now that his grandson happened to be emperor. 

She also noticed how blithely he admitted to never having answered his daughter’s letters. This was a bit more than just a foolish thing to do! 

It was not her place to criticise, and she didn’t want to mar Maia’s enjoyment of what was likely the first time ever that he got to do something so normal as going to a market with his grandfather. So she said nothing. 

 

Keeping an eye on all marketgoers was a nightmare. The only thing that made Kiru feel slightly better about it was that no one could have known in advance that the emperor was going to be there. 

That was, unless it was the Great Avar himself who plotted ... but like with the Ceredada, it would profit him more to wait until there was a heir.

It was pure joy to watch Maia interact with the horses. The childlike happiness in his face made Kiru feel so much better about having told him way too much about her sister. And the fact that she would have killed his father. And ... well, there were lots of things she should, in retrospect, not have told him. 

He listened with confused interest as his grandfather rambled on about horses, a topic that Kiru herself had little expertise in. 

“As a beginner, you will want to ride a gelding –“

Everything seemed to happen at once. The gallopping horse, pulling Maia away from it, Telimezh pushing Maia away from it, the Avar jumping out of the way, the horse’s hooves meeting Telimezh’s body. 

When Kiru was able to assess the situation, the Avar was talking to the horse in a calming voice. 

“Serenity?” 

Telimezh had collapsed on top of the emperor. Their respective weights meant this could not be comfortable for Maia. 

“We are well!“

He obviously was not, but Kiru decided not to ask further questions. She knelt next to them both and assessed Telimezh’s state. One of his legs was obviously broken. 

“Lieutenant Telimezh? Can you hear us?” Being only able to see the back of his head, it was not easy to see whether he was alert. 

“Kiru? Is that you? Oh! Serenity, we are so sorry -.“

Kiru took pity on him. “An you have no further injuries, we can move you away.”

“We do not know – our back hurts. Upper right side.”

Not the spine then. Good. Taking care to not move him more than necessary, Kiru lifted him a bit so that Maia could crawl out from under him. Evidently uninjured, he stumbled in the general direction of his grandfather. 

“Serenity, stand where we can see you, please!”

“Oh. Of course.” He shuffled closer. „Is there anything we can do to help?“

“We would prefer for you to get out of here before we heal Lieutenant Telimezh. We cannot have our eyes everywhere.” But she could not risk for a broken rib to puncture his lungs. She shoved her hand under his thankfully loose-fitting clothes and felt for the rib. It was out of place, but not too much. “We can heal this so it will hold for the transport back to the palace. But it will have to be broken again to set it.”

“Do what is necessary for his Serenity’s safety.”

That, she decided, was permission to do what she thought best. She cast the maz and stood. 

In the meantime the horse merchant to whom, apparently, the crazed horse belonged, had found his way to them and prostrated himself. Among his hasty apologies was also a promise to put the horse to death.

“Now, now, that would be wasting a perfectly good horse.” The Great Avar patted the horse’s side. “Do you not agree?”

Maia looked at the prostrate merchant, then at his grandfather. “We agree. It would be a waste. And we are sure you did not mean for this to happen.”

“We should not have brought him – we thought we could sell him for breeding, you see, his anxiety is due to mistreatment in his youth – a very fine horse, but ...”

“Stand, please.” 

“Serenity, may we suggest that you step back?” She did not like how close that atranger was, especially now as he scrambled to his feet. “Also, we should like to know whether there was anything in particular that startled this horse.”

“Athmaza, it is the strangest thing. We had just told someone that Swiftsilk here is afraid of a certain tune about half an hour before, and just now, someone whistled that very tune! It is not a very common one, so we did not think ...”

“That”, Kiru said coldly “Is obvious.” If the man was not malicious, he must be very stupid. 

His Serenity gave her a disapproving look that rivalled Beshelar’s. “Keep yourself ready to be questioned by our guards”, he said, in a much friendlier tone. 

“We will have him guarded”, the Great Avar promised. “While we discuss this horse.”

Kiru did not like it one bit. What if those two were working together? On the other hand, her options were limited, and what was most important right now is that they all got back to the palace safely. 

She ordered two commoners to build a makeshift litter from two poles and her cloak, and carry Telimezh to the palace. 

They arrived there without further trouble, and the doctor was called. 

“A broken leg, and a broken rib that we fixated with a maz. It needs to be broken again to be properly set” Kiru reported. “Possibly other injuries.”

“Get him to a bed, then.”

 

“We should, perhaps, give our nohecharei more spacious quarters”, his Serenity observed, standing in Telimezh’s small room. “Seeing as they spend so much time injured and in bed.”

“Serenity.” Kiru did not point out that it would not be as crowded if he had not insisted on being there. 

She stared at the opposite wall, to spare Telimezh’s dignity. Whatever shreds of it he had left. He had been stripped naked to the waist, and had refused a maz against the pain, sensibly stating that she should save her energy for emergencies.

Now he hissed, clearly struggling not to scream in pain, as the doctor forcibly pushed his rib back in place. 

Then came the leg, and Telimezh whimpered, and Kiru could hear the rustle of Maia’s garments as he flinched at the sound. 

She understood Telimezh’s reasoning, but suspected she would feel really bad about it when they ended their shift and no further emergency had arisen. Surely, only so many attacks – or accidents – could happen in one day. 

When the whole procedure was over and a young maza had healed the broken bones according to Kiru’s instructions, it was too late to go back to the market, so they just escorted his Serenity back to his rooms, where he took a nap during which they changed shifts. 

No emergency. Kiru sighed. „You just did that to punish yourself, did you?“, she asked Telimezh in a whisper as they walked through the hallways. “The Adremaza could have cast a maz against the pain, too.”

“There was no need to trouble him with this”, Telimezh replied. “And, as we said, an emergency could happen. Our comfort is of no consequence.”

“Our shift is over now, and nothing has happened.” She shook her head. “Do you still blame yourself for Dazhis’ betrayal?”

“We should have seen it coming”, he muttered. “And then there was the arrow. We feel we are ... a failure.”

“You were not trained for this. Everyone just relies on this being a purely ceremonial position. Which we admit we think foolish. Nevertheless. You are not to blame. We hope the pain felt cathartic and you finally feel able to let go.”

“We do feel better. At least this time we did our duty.”

“And admirably so. We doubt we could have reacted as fast. Thanks to you, his Serenity is unharmed.”

“You did react, and perhaps helped push his Serenity out of harm’s way. We cannot remember all.”

“Ah. Do remember to tell us an you feel any dizzyness or headache. We hope your inability to remember all is due to it happening so fast, but on the off chance ...”

“Of course, Athmaza. We will.”


	24. Chapter 24

Winternight festivities went on all night, so Kiru was able to attend them after sleeping only insignificantly less than usually. 

She had just finished her slightly more elaborate braid – a vanity unbefitting a servant of Csaivo, but she wanted to celebrate – when she heard screams. 

Moments later she arrived at the scene of the crime. The panicked masses parted to let her through, and those who did not felt her elbows. 

There, close to the emperor’s throne Beshelar lay in a pool of what was presumably his own blood. Maia knelt next to him, the white robe stained red. 

Cala stood next to the throne, pale as snow and slightly trembling. The distinct smell of a revethmaz lingered in the air. 

The lifeless body nearby, Kiru concluded must be the attacker. Good. 

Maia stooped, drenching his disheveled hair in blood as he kissed Beshelar’s forehead, awkwardly avoiding the blade stuck in the nohecharis’ chest. “I am so, so sorry.”

It was like something out of a theatre scene, she mused, feeling somewhat removed from the reality of what was happening. 

“Serenity”, Beshelar whispered with what he probably thought to be his dying breath. 

Not if Kiru had anything to say about it. 

Maia changed his position to place Beshelar’s head in his lap, and Kiru did nothing to discourage him. It would do no harm to comfort the soldier, much as she hoped this wouldn’t be his last moments. 

First, she cast a maz to slow the bloodflow. “Lieutenant Telimezh was right, it appears.” Though he could not possibly have known.   
She knelt next to Beshelar. “Serenity, we will pull out the blade. Would you hold him down while we do so?”

Maia nodded. His face was ashen, but he placed his hands on Beshelar’s broad shoulders. 

“Alright. One, two –“ She pulled out the blade. „Three.” The trick was to cast the maz already while counting one. It was not without risk, but she had counted on it that this time, at least, the blade was really just what the hilt indicated – a normal dagger that would leave no nasty surprises in the wound. 

She checked the pulse. A bit weak, a bit slow, but nothing alarming. Then she checked for poison. Nothing that she knew, at least. 

Now to the less urgent cases. “Cala?”

No reaction. 

“He has been like this ever since ... we assume he killed Tethimar. Then, we think, he tried to help Beshelar, but it did not work, and ...”

“Ah.” Cala was much too young and innocent for this. It should have been her. Though perhaps not. She might not have been able to just cast a revethmaz. She would have wanted Tethimar to suffer, suffer as she had not been able to make Varenechibel suffer. “He will recover in due time, we think. A warm blanket and a hot drink should help.”

“Oh. Of course.” 

“Serenity? Athmaza? Is there anything we can do?“

Dach’osmin Ceredin was standing outside the circle of guards that Kiru had not even noticed while pushing her way through the crowd. 

“We would like for someone trustworthy – you, for example - to keep an eye on things while we accompany his Serenity to the nearest lavatory.” If she was not much mistaken, he was feeling nauseous right now. And it would not do to have everyone witness the likely result of this nausea. 

“We are glad to be of use, Athmaza, Serenity.” Without further ceremony, Dach’osmin Ceredin moved to a point from where she could see both nohecharei. 

As Kiru’s gaze fell on Beshelar, she remembered the maz she had cast. Slowing his blood flow – of course his pulse would be changed! She undid the maz, then softly touched Maia’s shoulder. “Come with us, please.”

He did not protest, but seemed rather embarrassed about the whole thing after he had emptied his stomach and Kiru had helped him wipe his face. 

Well, better that way than having it happen in front of the court. 

“It is a perfectly understandable reaction to being very nearly assassinated.” Though she supposed that Beshelar’s wound had contributed more to his shaken state than the attempt on his own life. “We suggest that you go to bed, Serenity.”

“We would, but we do not think we could sleep.”


	25. Chapter 25

And Maia did, in fact, not go to bed before the whole assassination plot had been thoroughly investigated, and it had turned out that the same conspirators had also been responsible for the airship crash, the poisoned arrow and the spider. 

Even then, he did not sleep. 

Of course not. Of course he would still see Tethimar’s face. And the blood, so much blood, the dagger in Beshelar’s chest .. it did not lend itself to pleasant dreams. 

Kiru hesitated only shortly. It was, after all, her duty to protect the emperor’s spirit. 

She would have sung a lullaby, only, she knew none, so she sang the most comforting song she did know. 

It was one wherein the spirits of women wronged by men lured the same kind of men to their deaths. Her sister had sung it to her for the calming melody, and later, Kiru had found unexpected comfort in the rather gloomy subject of the song. 

Maia did seem to find it soothing enough. The sounds coming from his bed could be crying, but being able to cry, in Kiru’s experience, required some measure of peace. So that was good. 

 

Changing shifts, by necessity, took place when his Serenity was still asleep. Cala tiptoed in as quietly as possible. 

Kiru placed a hand on his shoulder. “Tethimar deserved it.”

He flinched. “It was so ... so easy”, he whispered, barely audible. “To end a life ...”

“Fast runs the river in a narrow bed.” She squeezed his shoulder. “He forced thy hand.”

That, finally, seemed to help. Cala must have been afraid she now considered him a cold-blooded killer. What, then, must he think of her? 

 

Kiru quietly opened and closed the door, and would only have given Beshelar a friendly nod, had he not gestured for her to stay. 

“Can we change shifts again when his Serenity wakes?”

“What?”

Beshelar closed his eyes and a pained expression crossed his face. “We apologize. We should have thanked you for saving our life, first. Still. We would prefer to not have to face his Serenity anytime soon.”

“Why?”

“Were you not there?”

“We distinctly remember you almost dying in duty. Which is very honourable and nothing to be ashamed of. We are confident you will be able to stand his Serenity’s concern for your health.”

“That is not it!” Even though he spoke in a whisper, his distress was plain in his voice. 

“Then what is?”

“We asked his Serenity to hold us!”

“Which we are sure he would have done in any case. We did arrive just in time to see his Serenity kiss you. From which we conclude that any previous impropriety has been forgiven.”

“His Serenity believed we were going to die, then.” 

“And we are sure he is very glad you have not. In fact, we recall he thanked us several times for preventing your untimely demise. So, what is your problem?”

“We did not expect to have to live with ... with all of this.” A blush crept up in Beshelar’s face. “How can we look his Serenity in the eyes knowing that he kissed our forehead and we liked it?”

“We are sure his Serenity intended for you to like it. And perhaps you should tell him that. He might be worried you might disapprove of such overt familiarity” 

“There is no reason why we would disapprove. His Serenity’s actions were gracious and kind, and we should feel honoured.” His ears stood upright with unnatural stiffness. 

“Ah. There is, we gather, some subtle difference between feeling honoured by something, and liking it? We admit that we previously assumed that, at least to you, there would be no such difference.” Dying in his emperor’s arms and being shown such favour was what she would have imagined Beshelar’s dearest ambitions to be, if she had at all thought about it. 

“There is a difference between, ah, the pure and noble enjoyment of a honour granted, and ... um ... that is ...”

Kiru stared at him. Did he mean to imply … “Are we talking involuntary bodily reactions here?” First Telimezh and now this? What had she done to deserve that? Just because she had no problem with any body part as such didn’t mean she couldn’t experience secondhand embarrassment. Especially with Beshelar’s ability to radiate mortification. 

Beshelar frowned. “We cannot recall what our ears betrayed. Still. We should not have asked his Serenity to hold us because we feared death. We should not have been so cowardly. And we should not have felt ...” Again, confusion on his face. 

Perhaps this was not as bad as she had first suspected. One could hope. And it was like Beshelar to make a big problem out of nothing. 

“Ah. Lieutenant, we believe this might be a health related problem. May we try something?”

“Of course.” There was hope in his voice. “You mean, this might be curable?”

“We do think so.” She stepped forward, placed a hand on his shoulder and watched his face. 

His ears relaxed in an instant. For a moment, he positively melted into her touch, then an expression of shock crossed his face, and he became tense again. 

“This was exactly what we were talking of”, he admitted. “We should not feel like that.”

His expression was utterly serious. He really did not seem to understand ... did he really think that having emotions was something that required a cure? 

“Lieutenant, when have you hugged someone the last time?”

“When have we ... is this really relevant?”

“We believe so.”

“Our sister visited us to congratulate us on our appointment as nohecharis. We recall that she hugged us while doing so.” There was only the tiniest change on his features, but it was enough for her to deduce that he was very fond of his sister. 

Kiru sighed. “There is a theory among those in the healing profession”, she said slowly. “That being touched by others once in a while is beneficial to the health.” She eyed him. “When your sister hugged you, do you remember it feeling about the same as when we touched you just now?”

He blinked. “We are not sure. Probably. That would have been ... appropriate we suppose. Yet it is most certainly not what we should feel when a healer examines us – nor what we ought to feel when our emperor ...” 

“Lieutnant, we are a cleric of Csaivo. We believe that reacting to our touch the same as you would to your sister’s is, in fact, the more appropriate alternative.”

Beshelar blushed a bright red. “Athmaza, we did not mean to imply –”

“We know that. And we get that you think the touch of your emperor should feel to you no different than that of cold marble. However, we think that despite all the concerted efforts of the court to pretend otherwise, his Serenity is still a person and would, occasionally, like to be treated as such.”

“Athmaza?!”

Of course, the idea that an emperor was a real person would be alien to Beshelar. Though not so very alien that he would not have stroked Maia’s hair during the poisoning incident, her memory supplied. At least part of his mind must be aware of the concept. “We believe that his Serenity meant, first and foremost, to comfort you. Did you feel comforted?”

Beshelar blinked. “Very much so”, he admitted quietly.

“Then we fail to see a problem. Though we recommend that you do something about your lack of touch.”

“Do something about it? Surely you do not imply that we should ...” He gave her a look that was not only full of disapproval, but of disgust. “Pay for ...”

“We would never suggest that you go to a whore.” Had he so little faith in her? “Have you not any friends?”

“None so close that ...” He cleared his throat. “We have never found it easy to make friends.”

“And it has not become any easier.” Of course. Besides not having the time, there would now be those who just sought to use him to get to the emperor. “Regardless. Let me assure you that there is nothing to be ashamed of.”


	26. Chapter 26

Kiru was not surprised that Maia insisted on talking to the man who had invented the device that had crashed the Wisdom of Coharo. 

And she was not at all surprised that he felt terrible after that. Cala need not have told her when changing shifts. 

The worst thing was: The man was right. The usual workings of the realm quite probably killed more people each day than the crash had. 

Even had it been her place to offer an opinion, Kiru could have given Maia no comfort. 

Her suggestion to go to the Chapel of All Gods and meditate, however, was gratefully accepted. 

 

Afterwards, Maia did not say what insights Cstheio had granted, but did seem significantly more stable. 

 

It lasted, so far as she could tell, until Kiru’s next night shift when, once again, he started to fret about his marriage. The wedding was drawing closer, and apparently, Maia was still upset about his lack of experience and a perceived lack of attractiveness. 

“Actually”, Kiru cleared her throat. “We thought that, since your grandfather is so affable, you could ask him for advice?” That would be appropriate. Not even Beshelar could disapprove of that. His Serenity’s grandfather was both high enough in rank and actually related. 

“He is affable, yes, but we feel we cannot quite forgive him. My entire life he never answered my – our mother’s letters.”

“There is that.”

“We do not really feel we can trust him on such an, ah, delicate subject matter.” There was some rustling of sheets as Maia sat up in bed. “Besides, he might just tell us to imitate horses. He does seem like the kind of man who would.”

“He is very knowledgeable about horses”, Kiru agreed. 

“And we do not want such advice. We are confident we could beget a heir. We just ... we just do not want our empress to hate us. We do not know how to win and keep a woman’s love.”

“Dach’osmin Ceredin gives you dancing lessons, Serenity.” No doubt, she would happily teach her husband everything else in due time. 

“Yes. Which is one of the reasons .. we fear that everything might change.” A sigh. “We fear that, once she fully understands what is expected of her, she will come to resent us for being so ... so ugly.”

“Serenity”, Kiru disagreed. 

“We are not feeling particularly serene at the moment.” A pause. “We are sorry. We should not inconvenience you with all this. We just wish ... we just wish our mother were here.”

Oh, to hell with propriety. She had made a mess of this already, so why not? 

Kiru stepped closer to the bed. “You are generally agreed to favour your mother, Serenity. Do you truly think ...?”

“We should not talk like that of ourself, you are right. However. It is well known that her husband wanted her out of his eyes. Our empress will not be able to relegate us.”

“Serenity. As a cleric of Csaivo we should not have an opinion on this, but ...”

“You are much closer to my mother in age than Csoru”, Maia observed. “I do not think there would be any impropriety ...”

“That we are.” She extended a hand, not quite making contact with the shoulder of his nightgown. “And no, there would be no impropriety.”

Maia leant into her touch. “Then why ...?”

“As a cleric of Csaivo we are encouraged to see deeper than the skin, to not react to how people look on the outside. However. We have to admit that we find all the ways in which you more resemble your mother very ... soothing to the eye.” Allegedly, Varenechibel had been handsome. She could not recall ever having seen it. In her memory, the sight of his face evoked a feeling of disgust. 

“Oh. Yes”, Maia replied softly. “Of course you would think that way.”

She hesitated. But then, it was dark, and no one would ever know. “Did you hear the rumours about us?”

“Ah. I heard of them, but have not felt it necessary to inquire what they actually were, considering they are untrue, anyway. Do you want to tell me?”

“We should, perhaps, explain.” After all, the edocharei seemed to have heard. But had perhaps not heard the truths that were circulated only among women. “We were overheard praying to Csaivo.”

“It would have been stranger for a cleric to not pray to her goddess, surely?”

“Indeed. But there is one prayer you will not usually hear from a cleric sworn to celibacy.”

“Oh.” Under her hand, his shoulder tensed for a moment. “Please explain.”

“The prayer is also appropriate for when one adopts a child.” She bit her lip. It was completely inappropriate, of course. “We ... we actually promised your mother to protect you as we would our own child.”

She waited for his shoulder to tense again, but it did not happen. Instead, he leant back, relaxing. 

“And I would not allow my child to think himself ugly.”

“I thank thee.” Maia sounded as though he was about to start crying. “But ...”

“There was no need for Dach’osmin Ceredin to kiss thy hand. Thinkst she would have done so with someone she found ugly?”

“I ... I am not sure. She was putting on a show for the guards.”

“When begging for mercy, one usually kisses the emperor’s robes. She could also have kissed the rings.” There were plenty rings to choose from, after all. 

“She did not.” A pause. “What exactly did those rumours say about you?”

Kiru withdrew her hand. “That we were with child, and grateful for it. Which would have implied that we had broken our vows.”

“With the implication that you might also break your oath of loyalty to us. This is serious. Why have you not told us earlier? We could have ... discouraged people from spreading such rumours.”

“We did speak to the superiors of those we suspect of having spread the rumours. We know that you do not doubt our loyalty, so we thought that sufficient, especially since there was so much else going on.”

“All these attempts on our life, you mean? Indeed. We imagine the gossips have found something else to talk about in the meantime. Still, it is good to know. We admit we have been curious.” A pause. “There are many things we are curious about but dare not ask for fear we might give offense.”

“Such as?”

“Such as what exactly happened when our nightshirt and sheets were poisoned.”

“We admitted to treating your Serenity in a rather undignified manner. Is there anything in particular you wish to know?”

“It is only a small thing really. Though we wonder ... did we only imagine that it was Beshelar holding us while you ... you washed us, we think?”

“That is what happened, Serenity.”

“We seem to remember that he... but that is silly. He did not pet our hair, surely?”

“Serenity. Which answer do you wish for?”

“The truth, please.”

“We think he did, Serenity. Is this a problem?”

“No, not at all. It was ... comforting. It is just that it does not fit with our overall impression of Beshelar.”

“We were not sure whether we were only imagining it ourself, Serenity.”

“We also seem to remember that he asked us to hold him when ...” Maia paused. “When he was wounded. Yet now he acts ... strange around us. We fear we have given offense. We had thought ... we felt a need to reassure him that we were there, and there was no way to get our arms around him. We admit that we have our knowledge of what is or is not appropriate for an emperor to do mostly from novels and the theatre performances we have seen recently, but ... we truly meant no harm.”

“Oh, Lieutenant Beshelar does not disapprove of anything you have done on that occasion, Serenity.”

“He told you so?”

“Indeed. He said to us that he ought to feel honoured.”

“Oh.” Maia’s ears drooped. “So he does not? We imagine ... we imagine he is not as fond of us as -”

“Serenity. He said he felt comforted.” Was she incapable of being sensitive in situations that were not the familiar hospital rooms where she had been told she was, indeed, very able to make patients feel at ease? Or was it just Beshelar’s social ineptitude rubbing off on her? She really could have predicted that Maia would catch the implications of ‘ought to’

“He did say so? Yet then, why ...?”

“Lieutenant Beshelar is a very strange man, Serenity. He seems to feel ashamed that he needed comfort at all.”

“Oh. Yes. That does sound like him.”

“We believe that, when you deigned to kiss him, in that moment, he was just a man who feared death and felt comforted at the touch of a friend.”

“We have been told that our nohecharei cannot be our friends.”

“Exactly, Serenity. That would be why Lieutenant Beshelar is so distressed.”

“We said before that we acknowledge that friendship is not possible, but that we do think we are allowed to be fond of someone. And were were under the impression that we had been properly condescending that time ...” Maia hesitated. “Though we admit we used the informal to refer to ourself. And apologized, which we have been told we should not. We were very upset.”

Kiru couldn’t suppress a chuckle. “Serenity. Insofar as we understand it, Lieutenant Beshelar feels it should be all the same to him which emperor he guards. It is a honour regardless of the emperor’s person.”

“He does like to act like that ... you do not agree with him, do you?”

“We believe that, despite many efforts to pretend otherwise, the emperor is a person, and, as such, one emperor is very different from the other. We are loyal to the person, not the position.” Kiru hesitated. She should not presume, but ... “We do believe, Serenity, that Lieutenant Beshelar, while he certainly is loyal to the position, is also loyal to your person and will go beyond the requirements of duty to ensure your wellbeing. Though he would never admit that.” 

Maia sighed. “No, we imagine not. So you say he is ashamed that, in a moment of weakness, he actually felt some fondness for us?”

“We assume that to be the case.” To tell the full truth would be to betray Beshelar’s confidence. “Though we admit the workings of Lieutenant Beshelar’s mind are a mystery to us, too.”   
She could hardly understand his lines of thought when he explained them.


	27. Chapter 27

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter, as well as the following ones, is betaed by dragonsigma.   
> (Any remaining mistakes are my fault for not listening to advice. ;))

When Kiru was called to the bedside of Csethiro Ceredin, she was pretty sure the headache was just a cover for some highly suspicious injury. That, or some embarrassing health problem. 

As soon as the door had closed behind Kiru and they were alone, Dach’osmin Ceredin sat up in her bed. “We apologize for taking up your no doubt limited time. However, it does trouble us to such an extent that it might become a health problem.”

Kiru dipped her head. “What can we do for you?”

“It is about our upcoming wedding.”

Her discomfort must have been apparent, as Dach’osmin Ceredin was quick to add: “Not about the, ah, aspects of the wedding night that a celibate cleric of Csaivo would not be qualified to talk of. Our great-aunt Arbelan has explained that to us.”

“We are glad to hear that, Dach’osmin.” Though she wondered whether Arbelan Zhasanai was any more qualified to soothe a maiden’s fears than Kiru was. 

“What we are worried about is rather more ... we would not ask were we not sure that it is not relevant to His Serenity’s safety, and not a secret of state. Did ... did he ever give any reason to believe that he ... finds us beautiful?”

Ah. So that was the nature of the fears that her great-aunt had instilled in her. “We have not heard him say it outright, but you must have noticed that he enjoys your company.”

“One could say we have become friends”, Csethiro agreed. “However, we can not help but feel lacking next to Min Vechin.”

“She is an opera singer”, Kiru agreed. 

“Excuse us? We would not have thought you the kind of person who would repeat the things they say about actresses.”

“We did not mean that.” Had it really sounded like that? “We merely meant to say that Min Vechin does have a beautiful voice, and that this trait would add to her attractiveness. It would be unwise for anyone not trained in the art to try and compete with her voice.”

“It would. And she is also beautiful.”

Kiru dipped her head. “Dach’osmin, you also have traits that add to your attractiveness.”

“We would not go so far to consider wealth or noble birth a character trait.”

“We were referring to your readiness to assist in our investigations regarding the poisoning incident, and your support after the more recent assassination attempt. Valour and loyalty are as esteemable as a beautiful voice, perhaps more.”

Csethiro regarded her with a baffled expression. “We imagine that, to a cleric of Csaivo there would be little difference. However, when it comes to, well, the desirability of a woman ...”

“You are not any woman. Dach’osmin, forgive our boldness, but ... you are to be empress. Loyalty is so much more important than, for example, a beautiful voice.”

“We know that empresses are not chosen for attractiveness”, Csethiro replied drily. “Which worked out so very well for the Empress Chenelo, did it not?”

Kiru did her best to imitate one of the disapproving expressions she had seen on Beshelar. 

“We mean no insult to Chenelo Zhasan. Only that ... well. We all know ...”

“His Serenity would not inflict on anyone the fate that he saw his mother suffer.”

Csethiro’s ears drooped. “We are not worried about that. We are worried that he will suffer in silence, as he would never say something that might offend us.”

Kiru cleared her throat. “We know for sure that his Serenity does not consider the upcoming marriage something to be suffered.”

“Not the marriage, probably, but the duty to father a heir.”

It would have been funny, had it not been cause to such distress. “His Serenity is worried that those matters might be unpleasant to you. He has, in fact, mentioned some concerns that he might not be sufficiently attractive to you.”

 

Csethiro stared at her, puzzled, then suddenly laughed. “Really? He ... oh, this sounds just like one of these comedies of misunderstandings that we always dismissed as unrealistic. Have we not shown him our regard in more than one way?”

“We believe”, Kiru replied cautiously “That His Serenity has not had opportunity to see all those plays and read all those novels that would provide the proper context to your actions.”

“Ah. We admit we had wondered. The letter we wrote after the first attempt to dethrone His Serenity would, no doubt, have been taken as insult by most. We had hoped he would see things differently.”

Kiru smiled. “He only understood that you consider yourself a warrior and offer to protect him.” 

“Most would have rebuked us for that alone.”

“We imagine that would have been the case. His Serenity was delighted when we explained to him that such an offer to duel for his sake would have been considered a most romantic gesture in a certain brand of novel.”

Csethiro’s ears rose a bit. “He did not mind that such an offer is most often made to a fair maiden in such novels?”

“Not at all. That is ...” 

“Please continue, Athmaza.”

“His Serenity has, occasionally, mentioned some concern about the fact that he is not fair-skinned.”

“Ah. Damned double meanings.” Csethiro frowned. “Though this is, perhaps intentional. There have always been prejudices against goblins ... He is worried about his skin colour? Really?”

Kiru shrugged. “He may have voiced some concern that he would look much different to you without all the emperor’s finery.”

“Oh, he would.” Csethiro smiled. “Yes, undoubtedly. We thank you for telling us. This must be remedied as soon as possible.” She paused. “There was something else we wanted to ask you. It was about something you said.”

“Dach’osmin?”

“Ah, yes.” Csethiro nodded. “You claimed to be glad that our aunt has instructed us on the matters of the marriage bed, but you did not look happy. We would not imply that you were lying, but ...”

“It is merely that we do not think her marriage was a happy one, even while it lasted.”

“Ah. We see what you mean. In fact, talking to her was very ... comforting, as we had first talked to our ‘friend’ Csoru.”

“Was not Csoru Zhasanai happy in her marriage?” As far as anyone could be happy with such a man. 

“Considering that she instructed us to lay back and think of the Ethuveraz, we have our doubts. Though of course she did also add that, while to her, patriotism was enough to bear the pain, being married to a half-goblin would require some poppy syrup to get through the nights. We will spare you the details, though we assure you they were very explicit.”

“His Serenity would never cause you pain.”

“From what Arbelan told us, we understand that he must, out of necessity, to father heirs.”

“That is what we have heard also. However, we conclude that, at least after the first time, part of that pain it is lack of attraction on the wife’s side, and the other half that the husband is a brute.”

“Ah.”

“By which, of course we do not mean to imply anything about the late emperor.”

“Of course not.” Csethiro grinned. “Though we do think that what Csoru told us implied a great deal, whether she meant it or not. Thank you again. We know that our husband is not a brute, so it seems we have nothing to worry about.”


	28. Chapter 28

Later that day, the nohecharei changed shifts while His Serenity was reading the letters of that day. 

“And here is one by Dach’osmin Ceredin”, Mer Aisava said, just as Kiru took Cala’s place. “Do you wish to prioritize it, Serenity?”

“Thank you. Put it aside, we will read it last.”

It was not Kiru’s place to tell the emperor when to read which letter, though she desperately hoped to be able to see his reaction to it. 

Fortunately, there was not so very much correspondence that day, and Maia ordered a cup of tea when he had finished all the other letters. 

The cup was placed in appropriate distance to the letter, as to run no risk of staining it, and then he opened the envelope, slowly as one would a birthday present. 

From where she was standing, Kiru could not see his face, but his ears indicated pleased surprise. 

“We did not know Csethiro was a poet.”

“Any well educated young lady of noble birth would be able to pen a poem”, Mer Aisava explained. “That only relates to knowledge of the conventions, of course, not things like creativity or originality.”

“Ah. Are there any conventions surrounding the subject matter of the poem? We seem to remember that Arbelan Zhasanai mentioned something along these lines.”

“Of course! There is an entire genre that, following convention, can only have nature as its subject.”

“It appears Csethiro sent us a poem on a sword.”

“Just a sword?” Mer Aisava sounded confused. “Ballads on battles of renown tend to include descriptions of the swords used, as well as the shields, the armour, and so on. But ... just a sword? That is rather unconventional. Perhaps it refers to her birthday present to you.” 

“It does not appear to be a ballad. We fear we are not familiar with this particular convention. There seem to be lots of alliterations.”

“Alliterative verse. It is not really used anymore, which would explain why you are not familiar with it, Serenity.”

“And it fits her using the barzhad.” Maia took a sip of tea. “We wish we knew more about poetry.”

“Perhaps it is a quote from an ancient poem?” 

 

“Steel shimmers stainless, caressed by the starlight” Maia recited. “Does that sound familiar?”

“Not to us, Serenity”, Mer Aisava replied. 

Kiru cleared her throat. 

“Kiru?”

“It does not sound familiar to us, either, but the starlight seems significant.” It was no secret that Maia most revered Cstheio Caireizhasan, the Lady of the Stars. 

“Oh! You mean she might have written with us in mind?“ 

“That seems likely.”

Maia read the letter again. His ears flicked forward as though to hear better. “Oh! She cannot possibly ...”

“Is there ...” Mer Aisava made a meaningful pause “... innuendo?”

Telimezh snickered. 

Maia turned around and shot him a questioning glance. 

“Forgive us, Serenity. It is just ... we think it very difficult to write about a sword without any innuendo. When we started training as guard ... well. It is not easy to talk about swords without innuendo, even. You mention a sheath, everyone starts giggling.”

“We cannot imagine that Beshelar would ever have done that.”

“Serenity, Lieutenant Beshelar did, indeed, never participate in such immaturity. Which is why others often suggested he should find some opportunity to, ah, sheathe his sword, as it were.” Telimezh blushed pink. “We apologize, we shouldn’t have repeated this.”

“Oh. Well. There is no sheathing of swords in here. Only drawing.”

“We would have been rather surprised if Dach’osmin Ceredin had intentionally written anything with that kind of rudeness in it”, Kiru stated. 

“Of course”, Telimezh hastened to agree. “There just is ... a lot of potential for accidental innuendo.”

“Should we answer in kind? We are not a poet ...yet simply thanking her somehow seems too little ...”

“It is the sentiment that counts”, Mer Aisava said. “And we can help. Normally, one would write something comparing the lady to a flower, but ...”

“This does not seem fitting for her”, Maia agreed. “What would a lady write to a man? What does one compare men to?”

“A hunter.” Mer Aisava’s ears pinned back. “An he has previously compared her to prey.”

“No, we think not. What about a gardener?”

Mer Aisava relaxed. “Strangely no one seems to have thought of that before, Serenity. It would be highly unconventional, we are afraid.”

“Flowers, gardeners. It seems to make sense. Ah, well. We assume it is because gardening is not a pastime for nobility.” He hesitated a moment. “What is a pastime for nobility from which we could derive metaphors?”

“Dancing seems adequate”, Aisava suggested. 

“It is something we would like to write on. However, we feel we should, in some way, acknowledge the ways in which Csethiro is different from other ladies at court. We would not really know what to write on dueling, though.”

“Are there any pastimes you like, Serenity?” Kiru asked. 

“We like theatre and opera. We would rather not write on that.” His ears drooped. “When we were a child, we sometimes fed birds. A rather solitary pastime, not suited to ... unless it might be adequate to compare a woman to a bird?”

Mer Aisava smiled. “That is deemed adequate, Serenity.”

“Good. Perhaps, then ... Csethiro reminds us not of a small songbird but rather ... of a raven.”

“A raven?” Mer Aisava was shocked. 

“They are clever animals. And they are very majestic.”

“Serenity, ravens are associated with Ulis”, Kiru said, tactfully omitting the fact that they were also considered to be ugly. 

“Oh. We remember now. There was a time in our life when we found the cries of ravens comforting for that very reason ... yes, that is not adequate. We are not sure what would be ...”

“A falcon, perhaps?” It would fit Dach’osmin Ceredin’s warriorlike personality. 

“Excellent choice”, Mer Aisava agreed. “Hunting with falcons is a completely appropriate pastime for nobility. You could compare yourself to the falconer.”

Thus avoiding the horrid implications of comparing anyone to prey. 

“Is there a way we could subtly convey that our admiration for Min Vechin has ... cooled somewhat, and we would never insult our empress by showing too much partiality for another woman again?”

“The nightingale is generally considered to be the most artistically inclined bird”, Kiru hinted. 

They had the poem half ready when duty called, and the completion of the answer had to be deferred, but when the Corazhas debate was finished, Maia immediately remembered his letter. 

“We think we have some new ideas.”

 

The finished poem was a thing of beauty. Kiru did not consider herself much of an expert when it came to the arts, but Mer Aisava said it was among the best he had ever read. “Ranking among those written by amateurs”, he amended when Maia questioned that praise. “We do not often read the work of professional poets.”

Kiru suspected that Mer Aisava had, indeed, a very thorough knowledge of what courtiers wrote in letters, and had amassed said knowledge by not exactly legal means. 

Be that as it may, the poem managed to get across that the nightingale had fluttered away and was not missed too much, and that the falcon was free to fly, but would be very much missed in case of a prolonged absence.


	29. Chapter 29

When she changed places with Cala in the evening, standing guard in the antechamber, Kiru noticed that something was different about him. 

“Thy hair ...” 

“Ah, that.” Cala tilted his head to the side so she could see it better. His queue was immaculate, not a hair out of place. “Dost like it?”

“It seems unnaturally tidy.” Kiru frowned. “Hast found a maz to keep it in place?” She would be very surprised if he had actually made that effort. 

“No. I asked Beshelar to braid it for me.”

Her ears flicked forward. “I thought thou didst not get along with him?” The last time they had had the time to talk at length had been just after Cala had become nohecharis. He had made it very clear, then, that he considered Beshelar to be on the same level with a man who kicked puppies for sport. Obsessed enough with formality to disapprove of the emperor’s familiar way of talking to the nohecharei, but at the same time insolent enough to actually voice his disapproval! The terms ‘cruel’, ‘pompous’ and ‘self-important’ had been used, Kiru recalled, as had “needs to remove the stick from his arse.”

“Oh, that. I had no opportunity to tell thee, but I had to somewhat amend my opinion of him after the ... incident when we all were in thy sickroom. Or actually, already before that. It is a rather long story.”

“I would listen to it.” She made sure to not obscure Cala’s view of the door before she settled in a comfortable standing position. 

“Well.” 

Talking of things of importance always required Cala to assemble his thoughts ... if he thought of it. When he talked of things he was passionate about, he sometimes forgot that, and his thoughts would come out half-formed and jumbled. Or at least he had used to be like that ...

“Perhaps I should start with Dazhis’ betrayal. As thou knowst I had regarded him a friend.”

Kiru nodded. 

“However, my surprise was mainly due to the naive assumption that someone I regarded as friend would not do such a thing. When I tried to find in my memory some proof that he was not capable of such a crime, I found ... nothing. We had not ever spoken of anything more profound than the joys and annoyances of our daily lives.” His previously absent-minded gaze focused on her. “Until then, I had thought it mere coincidence that, with thee, I have been able to discuss a wider variety of topics. Or, perhaps, attributed it to the fact that a cleric is more given to profound thought.”

“And now?”

“Now I think it is because thou art my closest friend.” 

“Oh.” She did not even try to keep the pleased surprise from showing on her face. 

“Thou seest, Dazhis was easy to like, in that he seemed to be much like me. Close to me in age, tormented by the same strict teachers ... and of course it was convenient to befriend him, as we had to spend so much time together, anyway. Thou, on the other hand ... hadst thou not saved me from my own stupidity that one time, I would hardly have had reason to talk to thee at all.”

“I would still say that thy thirst for knowledge was most commendable.” She could not help but smile at the memory. Cala had wanted to find out what, exactly, the limits of a maza’s power were, and to that purpose had cast the same maz so many times in a row as he could. He had been clever enough to choose for this exercise the weakest maz known to him, however, he could not have known that producing the energy for a fire would cool out his body at a faster rate than something else would have, and that, due to the heat produced by this, he would not feel the effects of overtaxing himself before he collapsed.

Kiru, who had never had much patience for those apprentice mazei who tested their power by producing the largest possible explosion, had taken an instant liking to the boy with the inquiring mind. At least he had tried to take reasonable precautions against getting hurt, which was more than could be said of others. 

“And I still thank thee for thy charitable interpretation of my foolishness.” Cala grinned. “Now, despite that, I could have easily never talked to thee again. I just chose to. Which I never questioned back then, but now think was because I knew, then, that thou art not only a very accomplished maza, but also a good ... woman.” 

She knew he had fought the instinct to say ‘person’, and was grateful for it. “Have I not proven thee wrong? Am I not as bad as Dazhis?” She could not quite keep the bitterness out of her voice. 

“I must politely beg thee to not insult my best friend. Come here.” He opened his arms, and Kiru stepped closer. 

Cala could probably just have pulled her head to his chest, but he never did that. He bent down awkwardly, so that she could rest her head at his shoulder when he hugged her. 

“Would’st not have murdered a good man”, he whispered. “Would’st not have taken vengeance for its own sake. Hast never even thought to avenge your sister on her murderer’s son.”

She swallowed. Tears trickled on Cala’s robe. “He is not like his father.”

“Some would not have cared. Some would not have cared how many wildflowers they trample in their efforts to cut down a rose.”

 

She felt Cala jump away before she even registered the noise of the door opening. 

When she had brought a proper distance between Cala and herself, Mer Aisava cleared his throat. “We have an urgent message for His Serenity.”

“Of course.” After ascertaining his identity, Cala stepped aside to allow him entry to the emperor’s bedroom. 

Kiru did not manage to get a look at Aisava’s face before the door closed behind him. It was a good thing that Maia trusted her ... no not only with his life, that was expected, he also trusted her to speak the truth, which was much more valuable. 

“Aisava can be trusted to always appear at the most inconvenient moment”, Cala groused. “Now, where was I? Ah, yes. Beshelar. Well, I told thee what Osmer Nelar did to His Serenity. Beshelar was there to hear it, too, and imagine my surprise when he was actually outraged for the right reason!”

Kiru smiled. 

“That was, perhaps, the first time I suspected he might actually have a heart. And then, there was, of course, the attempt to poison His Serenity. Beshelar actually followed your orders to, ahem, disrobe His Serenity without hesitation.” 

Considering that he had beforehand disapproved of the very idea that she might see Maia IN his nightshirt, that was indeed a remarkable change. Though of course it had been an emergency. 

“His actions that night forced me to admit that, stiff as he may seem, he is actually able to see past his notions of propriety.”

Kiru nodded. She, too, had been pleasantly surprised. 

“However, it was only when we stood at thy bedside and ... most decidedly heard nothing but the incoherent rambling of a fever patient, that I was forced to admit that Beshelar might actually be a genuinely good man.”

“Might?”

“He later asked about thy sister. I merely confirmed what he had already suspected. Turns out some of his strict notions regarding ‘conduct unbecoming an emperor’ align with my opinions on conduct unbecoming any being capable of sentient thought.” Cala smiled mildly. “He actually admitted that the breaches of etiquette that Edrehasivar VII has committed are laughable in comparison.”

“Did he, now?”

“I was surprised too. And when he assured me that he had, most certainly, not understood a word of what thou hadst said, but nevertheless disapproved most firmly of things an emperor might, in theory, do, though of course he has never heard of such a thing ... well. He is a good man. Not nice, and not pleasant, but good.” Cala touched his shiny, immaculate queue that had not even been much ruffled by the hug. “Though I must say, he has been rather different lately. Not exactly more pleasant to be around, and his only reaction to mine own turmoil was to assure me I had done my duty, but ... he, too, seems very shaken by that latest assassination attempt. That is, actually, what has prompted me to, ah, extend the hand of friendship, so to speak.”

“Thou hast asked him to braid thy hair”, Kiru said. “Without first offering him to use thy given name?”

“Oh.” Cala’s ears flicked. “That is how one usually does it, is it? I just ...”

Kiru nodded. In an environment where everyone was properly addressed by ‘Athmaza’, propriety tended to take second place to practicality. Being on first name terms did not mean much. They were, in a way, like a family. 

“It has not even occurred to me that Beshelar might even have a first name.” Cala scratched his head. “I am almost sure I have heard it, even, but I cannot remember.”

“Take care not to ruin thy queue, now that it is tidy for once.” Beshelar might actually consider that a disrespect to his efforts. “How did he achieve that? Did he glare thy hair into submission?” 

Cala chuckled. “Plausible as that sounds, no. He used some kind of powder to add some ... grip, I think he called it? Turns out he has a younger sister who works as hairdresser and has plans to open her own salon. She provides him with all that is needed to keep his hair in its unnatural state of tidyness.”

“He told thee this, unprompted?” Kiru was impressed. 

“Of course not. I forced him to reveal it by complimenting his skill. Since he would not take credit for his sister’s achievements, he had no choice.”

“I see.”

 

They were interrupted by Mer Aisava’s return, and Kiru decided to take her leave.


	30. Chapter 30

When Kiru went on duty the next day, Maia was answering letters. He turned to look at her, smiling. “Ah, Kiru. You quite startled Csevet last night.”

“Serenity!” Aisava stared at him, obviously feeling betrayed. 

“We are sorry. We did not deem it likely that someone would enter the room without knocking. We also trust that Cala could have reacted in time had there been a threat.” She would not justify her actions beyond that. She would not even acknowledge Aisava’s possible assumptions. 

“Of course. We admit we had not previously given much thought to ... you and Cala are friends, then?”

“Yes, Serenity.”

“It must be very inconvenient that one of you is always on duty.”

“Serenity, we knew that when we volunteered for the position.”

“That may be so, but it still seems inconvenient.” He gave a decisive nod. “We have concerns regarding this, anyway. Csevet, could we get away with adding a third pair of nohecharei?”

“It seems very revolutionary”, Aisava said slowly. “Perhaps when you have more firmly established yourself as emperor, Serenity?”

“Yes, we will have to wait. And then it would probably be best to only have them be on duty when we are not in public.” Maia frowned. “And of course, we will have to wait until there is someone qualified for the position ... we think we were told there were no dachenmazei other than you, Kiru?”

“We believe that, a year or so from now, there will be some more volunteers.” Both the reduced time they would be on duty and a long time having passed wherein no one had attempted to assassinate the emperor, would make the position seem much more desirable. 

Not being seen guarding the emperor in public would discourage some who wanted the fame, which in Kiru’s opinion was an added advantage. “And we would insist that one of the new ones is always on duty with one of us. Just in case.”

Maia nodded. “Of course. We will have to plan that carefully.” 

 

When he was finished with all those letters that could not wait, Maia opened this day’s letter from Csethiro Ceredin. 

Kiru could not see his face, but his ears indicated that he was very pleased indeed. After reading, he immediately wrote an answer. 

“We must thank you all for helping with the poem”, Maia said as he sealed the letter. “It does seem much easier to say some things this way.”

 

In the evening, His Serenity went to a theatre performance, accompanied by the first nohecharei. 

As such events were usually followed by social gatherings and discussion of the play, there was no telling when exactly His Serenity would return. 

Kiru and Telimezh sat where they would change shifts – the antechamber to the imperial bedroom – and settled in for a long wait. 

“His Serenity was very generous to suggest third nohecharei”, Telimezh said after a while. 

“Yes. We do hope he can carry out this plan. We are pleased that His Serenity has more of a social life now, but of course, this also means our shifts are less predictable.”

Telimezh nodded. “You should not mention that to him, though. He might actually try to return at a fixed time.”

Kiru chuckled. “Yes. That is entirely possible.”

He did not answer, but she could see his ears move. “May we ask a personal question?”, he finally inquired. 

“Certainly. We will decide whether we want to answer it.”

“We admit we are very curious ... what did you do to startle Mer Aisava so?”

Perhaps she should have justified herself, if only to let Telimezh know what had occurred. “We had been talking to Cala – the first time since we became nohecharo that we allowed ourself the luxury to have a longer conversation with him – and had just, ah, voiced our concern that we might not, actually, be worthy of his good opinion. Which is why he felt a need to embrace us. And it was in that very moment that Mer Aisava entered the room.”

“How awkward! Though we have to admit we cannot imagine how anyone’s good opinion of you could be undeserved.” Telimezh’s ears flicked with anxiety. “We do not mean that as flattery, Athmaza. We just ... you have saved our life more than once.”

“Strictly speaking, your life never was in any imminent danger.” Kiru smiled. “But we did not suspect you were trying to flatter us.”

“Good. We ... we admit we find it difficult to talk to you, Athmaza.”

“You do? Why?” Perhaps she had not made enough effort to get along with him? Had she, now that knowing everyone was not anymore an important part of her only purpose in life, changed the way she talked to people? Had others only ever been important to her as part of that plan?

“We have always found it difficult to talk to women.”

Kiru relaxed a bit. Perhaps this was not about her, personally. 

“And the fact that you are a cleric of Csaivo ... we understand that it is deemed proper to, ah, tell you about ... embarrassing health problems. However ... what about innuendo? Are we to avoid it, as we have been brought up to do in the presence of women, or would it insult you to acknowledge your sex that way?” Telimezh had blushed a bright pink. “We would, of course, try to, ah, watch our speech in His Serenity’s presence, anyway, but when this letter was discussed ...”

“You worry too much”, Kiru interrupted gently. “You can talk to us the way you talk to any man ... well, perhaps not quite. We have heard enough of how soldiers talk about women, and do not want to hear more.”

“Athmaza, we ... we never ..” His ears drooped with embarrassment. “We know what you mean, and it goes without saying ... and we want you to know that we respect your vows and an we ever give the impression that we do not, then do tell us, for it would be a misunderstanding.” He sighed. “We wish we had Lieutenant Beshelar’s ability to just not understand innuendo and the like.”

“We assume he must have been teased about it a lot.”

“That is true, but now there is not much time for anyone to do so, and ... we think it must be preferable to ... Lieutenant Beshelar would never be worried about having said something improper to a woman, because he is so very firmly convinced of his own propriety that he ... that is difficult to explain, but ...”

“Perhaps you want to give an example of the kind of thing he might say without noticing that it could be considered improper? We promise we will not be offended.” And perhaps he would be more comfortable afterwards. 

“Since you promise you will not be offended ... well. Soldiers have a duty to take care of their weapons, and swords need to be treated with oil regularly. Lieutenant Beshelar has been known to word his intention to do so in a way that, ah, could be constructed as meaning something else entirely, and others have teased him about it. Now, let us assume he said something like that in female company ... perhaps even worded in a way that might be taken to imply that the lady’s presence was the reason why his weapon needed maintenance ... we believe, because he wears his propriety like an armour, there is a chance a woman would not be offended by his saying such things. For he would not draw attention to his words by belated awareness of their meaning.”

Kiru chuckled. “We understand. You exist in that unhappy state in-between, where you understand innuendo enough to blush at having said it, but not well enough to be able to avoid it in advance?”

“Something like that, yes. And we do not know whether to apologize when we have accidentally said something that could be constructed to be something dirty, as that would imply you have a dirty enough mind to have understood it that way, and ...”

“And we are afraid we have. Complete purity of mind is hard to maintain in certain environments, and we doubt that even Lieutenant Beshelar has managed to stay ignorant of the way other people think about swords. You can apologize or not, as you like. We are confident we are able to recognize a honest mistake.”

“Thank you.” His ears rose to their normal position. “We meant to ask ... for this night shift, would you like us to guard His Serenity’s bedchamber so that you can spend some time with Cala Athmaza?”

“It is kind of you to offer, but ... we do not know, yet. Cala might be tired, and we wouldn’t want to detain him in that case. Do you have any preference one way or the other?”

“You may have noticed that we prefer to stand guard outside. That is because we think we should be the first to be surprised by any attack, and also because we think you might be more qualified to deal with ... well, of course with assassination attempts using poison, but also with such delicate matters as His Serenity suffering nightmares. We would not know what to do in such a case!”

He would not? “What do you do when fellow soldiers have nightmares?”

His ears pinned back. “We sleep alone now, but we used to shake them awake, which we do not think we should do with His Serenity. And, ah, some fellow soldiers found it amusing to make fun of the recurring nightmares of others. The standards for kindness were not very high.” 

The more she learnt about how soldiers socialized with each other, the less she liked it. She had heard some rudeness when treating their wounds and the like, but obviously it was worse when not kept in check by the respect most held for a cleric. “We are glad, then, that neither you nor Lieutenant Beshelar seem to be that kind of person.”

“One has to be at least able to pretend to have some measure of refinement to be promoted to the rank of Lieutenant, Athmaza. At least that is the case under Captain Orthema, and we are glad of it.”

“As are we. And we do think that His Serenity would be happy to be woken from a nightmare by any means necessary an the alternative was to just suffer it. However, we have to admit that we find it ... reassuring to be able to look at His Serenity during the night. Especially after the poisoning.”

“And we find it reassuring to know that you are there, should any such thing happen again. So perhaps, we can decide depending on how late they return?”

“And depending on whether His Serenity seems upset. Yes.”

 

Maia looked happy and content when they returned, but Cala yawned repeatedly, and Kiru signalled to Telimezh that she would guard inside. 

 

When they were alone in the darkness, Kiru heard the rustle of sheets indicating that Maia had sat up. “We ... I thank thee for telling me that Csethiro’s poem referred to me. I would never have made the connection!”

“I, ah, had the advantage of knowing that she intended to reassure thee of her esteem. She had ... asked me for advice.”

“Oh. Well. Still. Funny thing, though. Once thou pointed’st that out, it was rather obvious. Steel is grey. And Csethiro does find it beautiful. She seems to be rather fond of swords.” 

“Yes.”

“I am not sure what to make of the image of a sword being removed from a white and bejewelled sheath, though. Telimezh pointed out how innuendo works, and this does not seem to be, but ...”

Oh. Csethiro had written that? She might be an innocent maiden, but she no doubt knew what she wanted. “It might be, ah, innuendo of a sort that is less explicit than the usual kind.”

“Less explicit? But innuendo is never explicit.”

“Well, let me just point out that the edocharei do, ah, remove thy jewellery in the evenings.” And the clothes, too. 

Maia’s ears rose and Kiru thought that, had there been more light, there would have been a pleased blush visible even on his dark skin. “Ah. Most ... interesting.” His ears drooped a bit. “I hope this does not make thee uncomfortable? It is rather private. I should be able to understand such things myself, but ... ”

“Hast not grown up in court. Couldst not possibly be versed in the arts of conveying delicate information by subtle poetry”, she replied gently. “I am not uncomfortable, no. Though perhaps I would be reading that poem. As long as information is sufficiently, ah, theoretic and ... technical, I can cope with everything, as is required of a cleric of Csaivo.” She watched Maia’s dark form, huddled in blankets. “About that. I would prefer not to be here on thy wedding night.”

 

His ears drooped. “I can understand that, but ... I think thou wouldst make Csethiro less uncomfortable than Cala or Telimezh would, and ... and Beshelar ...” 

“Would have quite strong objections to being asked to see the empress in HER nightshirt? Yes. I thought that, perhaps, I could just make sure the window is barred and stand watch outside the door?”

“Oh. Yes. That would be preferable.”

“The tradition that the nohecharei are present at all times is partly because in theory, the empress could be a danger, too. However. I am willing to trust thy life as well as mine to Csethiro Zhasan.” 

“She will appreciate that.”

“I am not so sure. Which is why I will search her for hidden weapons. Not because I do not trust her, but because I think she would be disappointed and rebuke me for being remiss in my duties otherwise.”

“Ah. Yes. She thinks very highly of thee, and has expressed a hope to see more of thee after the wedding. Thy policy of trusting no one meets with her approval.”

“And I, in turn, am glad that she sees the necessity of such constant vigilance. After all, it will interfere with her daily life quite a lot in the future.”

“I rather hope that everyone wanting to assassinate me has had their turn by now.”

“So do I, but we cannot afford to act on such an assumption.”

“Of course not.”


	31. Chapter 31

Maia got up early the next morning, as he had a lot of meetings scheduled for that day. He looked a bit sleepy as he sat there reading through his letters, and Kiru rather hoped the meetings would not be too trying. Of course she could not ask what they were about. Unless, perhaps, she claimed that someone in the Corazhas had plans to assassinate His Serenity ... which of course was always possibly true ...

“Serenity!” Mer Aisava interrupted her thoughts. “Lieutenant Beshelar asks for an audience. He has expressed a preference for the time of ...” Aisava made a dramatic pause “Right now.”

“What?” Maia gave a start. “Beshelar? He is our nohecharis, why would he need an audience? Is his shift not scheduled soon, anyway?”

Kiru tensed. Beshelar would never do something so inappropriate if there wasn’t something amiss. Things must be very wrong indeed to prompt him to such improper actions. On the other hand, it could not be something concerning Maia’s safety; such an emergency would hopefully have caused Beshelar to just storm in. 

“Quite the opposite, Serenity. An he wants to ask something of you, he does need an audience, and moreover, he should request it in advance. However, he seems very distressed.”

“Show him in.”

Beshelar knelt as soon as he had entered. 

“Rise, please. What is wrong?”

“We wish to resign.” Beshelar stood, and now it was evident that he was ... disheveled, though only compared to his usual appearance. His uniform was ever-so-slightly shabby, it must be one he reserved for use when not on duty. 

“We asked to know what is wrong. Why would you wish to resign?” Maia’s ears were turned towards his nohecharis. Curiosity, not fear, Kiru was glad to see. 

“We fear we have given offense to our partner.” Beshelar shook his head. “No, we know we have. And Cala Athmaza is not replaceable. We are.”

“You very much are not! Cease this nonsense! We are sure it is nothing so bad that an apology could not fix it.”

Kiru silently agreed. Beshelar tended towards the dramatic. And not in the playful way that Csethiro Ceredin did; for Beshelar, it was all deadly serious.

“Serenity. Time might fix it, but time we do not have. Being angry at us will distract Cala Athmaza from his duties. This is way too dangerous.”

Kiru could have told him that Cala had likely been much more angry at him in the first week they had worked together than now. Unless he had actually kicked a puppy, which was rather unlikely. 

“Being upset that you resigned over something trivial would also distract him”, Edrehasivar pointed out. 

Beshelar nodded. “An your Serenity would allow it, we would trade places with Lieutenant Telimezh. Provided, of course, that Kiru Athmaza agrees to work with us ...” 

“No.” His Serenity said firmly. “We know you would be offended were we to treat you as our equal and give advice. Therefore, we shall give orders instead. You will stay here until Cala reports for duty, and then you will apologize to him.”

Kiru pressed her lips together to not chuckle. This approach was very much like one she – and His Serenity - had seen Idra use on his little sisters on one occasion. Normally, she would not think it would work on adults, but since Beshelar was already so remorseful ... probably Cala had just been grumpy due to lack of sleep and had snapped at him over something trivial. The only mystery here was why Cala had not apologized after no doubt noticing how upset Beshelar was ... 

“Serenity.” Beshelar blushed, very obviously aware of the fact that he was being treated like an unruly child. His ears would probably have drooped even lower had that been possible. 

“We do not mean to belittle your distress, but we are sure it can only be something trivial. Perhaps you want to tell Kiru about it.” Maia gave her an apologetic smile. 

“Come.” She led Beshelar to an unoccupied corner of the room. “Now, what happened? Have you kicked a puppy?”

He stared at her, clearly puzzled. “Why would we do such a thing?”

“That is one thing that would make Cala truly angry. We said that in jest. We trust, as does His Serenity, that you would not do anything truly bad, so we find ourself confused.” Especially since Cala seemed to have changed his opinion of Beshelar for the better. 

“Cala Athmaza slammed the door shut on his way out”, Beshelar replied, as though that explained everything. 

It would really take a lot to drive Cala to do that, but had Beshelar done something reprehensible, Cala would have reacted in a much more noteworthy way. “What did you actually do?”

“We refused to call Cala Athmaza simply by his given name.” He stared at his feet. 

How _could_ he! How _dare_ he? After all that Cala had done to get along with him! “Lieutenant Beshelar, we ...” She took a deep breath. “We understand that such familiarity would feel uncomfortable to you. We assure you, it very much is a triviality, and Cala will not hold it against you once he has had time to think about it.” It must have taken a lot of courage to offer this – and to be rejected so cruelly! 

“That is not ...” Beshelar seemed to shrink. “It actually began when he asked us to braid his hair.”

Ah. Perhaps she should have questioned that development more. For someone so reserved as Beshelar, it was uncharacteristic. “You could have declined.”

“In retrospect, we should have. It was just ... we admit we had previously thought him intentionally neglectful of his appearance. We felt it was our duty to ... we were so pleased to learn that it was such an easily remedied problem.”

Kiru stared at him. He had actually been _disappointed_ to learn that Cala had by no means developed a sudden interest in appearances, but sought his friendship?   
Clearly, her sympathy for his devastating loneliness had been given prematurely. Such a man did not deserve to have friends. 

Poor Cala. He must have felt very much like a kicked puppy. 

“He explained to us that he found it difficult to braid his own hair, and we ... obliged. We acknowledge our own contribution to the problem; we should have refused, then. He clearly does not understand ... though we tried to explain ... we should not have encouraged him.”

“Probably not.” Hopefully Cala would report for duty soon, so she could give him a hug. “You tried to explain?” Surely, Cala would see that, while it hurt, he had no right to anyone’s friendship. 

“We did try to impart to him that the formal and the familiar exist for a reason, and that one does not switch to using first names on a daily basis simply because such might be more _practical_ in an _emergency_ , but ...” A pained expression crossed his face. 

Kiru frowned. She would have thought that the efficiency of it might appeal to someone with Beshelar’s personality. 

“We tried so in vain. We are sorry to have offended him, truly. Yet we find we simply cannot ... we can see how it would not be of any importance to someone with as many friends as he has fingers, but, Athmaza, these things actually mean something to us.”

She stared at him, trying to process what he had just said. 

“Yes. We know. We should get a grip on ourself. And we will. We will apologize as His Serenity has ordered, and we may just as well just accept Cala Athmaza’s offer, now.” He had, apparently, gotten a ‘grip on himself’ as his ears had risen to their normal position, though unnaturally stiff. There might be a wet shimmer in his eyes, but perhaps it was just her imagination. 

“Lieutenant Beshelar, an you have thought Cala has ever cared in the least what his hair looks like, you are very much mistaken.”

This confused him sufficiently to shatter his self-control. His ears drooped again. “He told us you had complimented him on his hair?”

“We have merely expressed our surprise that it is possible to actually achieve such a state of tidyness with his hair structure.”

Beshelar blushed pink. “We did not mean to imply that you did anything .. improper or against your vows, we just ...”

“We know. However, we believe you do not fully understand. Listen. Csaivo encourages her followers to not judge after appearances. Celibacy is required of us not as for its own sake, but as a means to remove any incentive to pay attention to physical beauty.” And Cala certainly knew that what she approved of were his attempts at befriending his partner, not his improved appearance. “When he told you that we had complimented him, he meant that –“

She fell silent as Cala walked in, without knocking, or in any other way drawing attention to his existence. As was proper for the emperor’s nohecharei. 

“Cala.”

Cala blinked. “Serenity?”

“We believe that Beshelar owes you an apology.” His Serenity cast Kiru a questioning glance. She nodded. While Beshelar had not intended to give offense, an apology might help clear things up. 

“Oh, no, not at all. We should apologize.” Cala touched his queue, which was back to its usual untidy state. 

Beshelar stepped forward. “Athmaza, please accept our apologies. We see now that we have been oversensitive and petty. An your offer still stands, we would now accept it.” He bowed deeper than he would have to to an equal. 

Cala bowed, somewhat lower. “Lieutenant, we deeply regret our presumptuous behaviour. We cannot accept an unwarranted apology. You have done no wrong, and ... can we please just pretend that unfortunate conversation never took place?” 

“Of course”, Beshelar replied. 

 

They took their respective positions, and the second nohecharei left. Kiru gave Cala’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze when she passed him. “It is not so bad as it seems”, she whispered before she followed Telimezh outside.


	32. Chapter 32

They took their respective positions, and the second nohecharei left. Kiru gave Cala’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze when she passed him. “It is not so bad as it seems”, she whispered before she followed Telimezh outside. 

 

“We are confused”, Telimezh said as they headed to the kitchens. “Lieutenant Beshelar made it sound so dramatic, but it seems, nothing much actually happened?”

“We tried to speak quietly, as to not disturb His Serenity. We can explain things over lunch.”

 

Lunch was beef ... again. It was the privilege of the first nohecharei to most often get to eat what was left of the emperor’s meals. Kiru would not have minded, had not the household steward seen it fit to feed the nohecharei lots of meat, probably in the hopes that it might help the soldier nohecharei grow more muscles.   
Perhaps she should spread the rumour that a maza’s brain desperatedly needed vegetables for proper function. She had no proof for that, but it might well be true. 

“There is lamb’s lettuce”, Isheian told her. “I saved you some of my portion.”

“Should’st not have”, Kiru muttered. However, the girl did not much care for salad, and would probably not have eaten it in any case, which was why Kiru accepted anyway. 

 

“Your favourite food?” Telimezh observed while they followed Isheian to a currently unoccupied dining room. 

“One of our favourites, yes. What are your favourite foods?” 

“Anything flavoured with garlic comes to mind, as we can now only eat it when His Serenity does, too.”

Of course. There were actually rules about that. Maia would certainly make an exception if asked, but considering that he never got a moment of privacy, keeping annoying smells away from him was not asked too much.   
“Ah. That is unfortunate.” Perhaps there was a maz to remove the smell. It must be possible to create one in any case ... 

Their arrival at the room they were to eat lunch in interrupted her thoughts. 

Isheian put the tray down on a small cherry-wood table, put plates and salad bowls, glasses and the pitcher of water on the table in what seemed like not time at all, without spilling any of the contents. 

There was a reason she had been chosen to serve the emperor. 

To Kiru’s disappointment, Isheian left without asking any questions about her day – probably because Telimezh was there, too. 

“You often eat here? We noticed there is a fire burning”, he gestured towards the fireplace. 

“Not here, specifically. Just where we will be least in the way. The kitchen staff usually know that in advance. Where do you eat when not on duty?” 

“We used to order some food to our room. Or, occasionally, eat with the soldiers. Though we do not do _that_ often anymore.”

“Why not? Do you not have old friends among them?”

“None that we were really close to. We used to like to talk to some, but the gossip ...” His ears drooped. 

“Ah, the gossip. Did you hear the rumours about us? We would like to know how far they have spread.” She started eating with the lettuce. 

Telimezh blushed pink. “We cannot imagine you would want to hear ... that. You expressed a distaste for, ah, the way soldiers talk about women ... ”

“We are sure you can word them in a more tasteful way. There is no need to worry, we already know we have been accused of breaking our vows.”

“Yes. Well. Those rumours have, indeed, caused us to drop some old acquaintances. We admit we are not quite sure how to react to them. A defense of your virtue that is perceived as too passionate would lead to even worse rumours ... yet of course we cannot just let such disgusting allegiations stand unchallenged ... ” He poured himself some water and drank. 

“You could always threaten to tell us. After Cala has demonstrated just how easily a maza can kill, they would probably not want to risk that.” Kiru smiled. “That is, do not phrase it as threat. Just tell them that we would find those rumours most amusing.”

“Amusing?”

“We can prove our innocence, and His Serenity believes us, anyway, so yes, these rumours are nothing but a source of amusement to us. We merely worry how they might reflect on His Serenity. However, it should soon be evident that we are not with child.”

“Of course.” Telimezh stared at his plate. “So in case any new gossip starts ... we should just imply that we will tell you?”

“We believe that would be most efficient.”

He nodded. “So ... what did Beshelar actually do? We have overheard bits and pieces, but ... in case it is confidential, we would not pry ...”

 

“Oh, it is a very simple matter.” She poured herself some water and took a sip. “On the surface. And we believe it is better to tell you than let your imagination run wild. Cala just asked Beshelar to call him Cala. And Beshelar declined.”

“He declined?” Telimezh finally started to eat his beef, and, after some mouthfuls added: “We know that Lieutenant Beshelar is a very reserved man and not on first name terms with anyone we know, or, in fact, know _of_. However, we had not known that he dislikes Cala Athmaza so strongly.”

“Interestingly enough, we do not think he does. We think there has been a misunderstanding.”

Telimezh’s ears flicked forward. “What misunderstanding could there be about something as simple as that?”

“Have you not voiced some concerns that we could misunderstand something you say?”

“Well, yes, but that is different. You are a woman.”

“We cannot remember that we ever misunderstood something that Cala said, or the other way round. We find it very easy to understand the workings of his mind.” She shrugged. “Had we told you to simply call us Kiru, what would you have thought?”

“That you deem us worthy of your friendship.”

“Which would have been correct. However, had we added that among mazei, pretty much everyone uses first names, as we do not have any other, and as such, we do not consider it to mean much?”

He stopped eating and seemed to consider that for a moment. “We would have asked you to clarify whether you would also use our first name, then, even though, to us, that would mean a great deal more.”

“Which must be where Lieutenant Beshelar made a mistake.”

“He simply assumed that ... well, but that was what we initially assumed, that he feels uncomfortable with someone using his given name.”

“The mistake made, as we understand it, was in the opposite direction.”

Telimezh frowned. “Wait. You say he refused the offer on the grounds that he simply assumed Cala Athmaza would continue to address him by his last name? Well, of course, such an arrangement would be ... it would imply to outsiders that he has no respect at all for his partner, and that ...”

That, of course, was something that Beshelar could never countenance. No one who cared about public opinion even a little would want to be perceived in such a way. 

“Yes. However, Cala never meant it like that. Of course. One may lose perspective for how things are in the outside world, and indeed there are those so wrapped up in their studies that they would probably not be able to function outside the Athmaz’are, but Cala has not yet reached that level.”

“We see. Left to our own imagination, we would probably have imagined a much more grievous insult, and wondered how it can be so easily forgiven.”

“That is why we thought it better to tell you.” Beshelar was difficult enough to get along with, even without his fellow soldiers thinking that he had committed some horrible crime. “We trust you will not talk to anyone else of this – or, in fact, to Beshelar. We are not entirely sure our observations are correct.”

 

For a while they did not talk, concentrating instead on their meal. When Telimezh had finished his, and Kiru was close to deciding to actually leave the rest on the plate, he spoke again. “We understand now, how easily misunderstandings might arise from differing experiences. Do you find you often have to discourage people from being overly familiar after you saved their lives?“

Did she? Thinking back to the hospital ... “It has sometimes happened that a patient formed an inappropriate emotional attachment, yes. We were glad, then, to be able to simply remind them of our vows.”

Telimezh nodded slowly. “We had not previously made the connection ... we had thought the vows to be an obligation, much like our oaths as nohecharei. We had not thought they could be ... helpful.”

“Perhaps it is different for others. We have never wanted to marry, and as such, we find it useful to have that ... officially confirmed, in a way.” 

“Put like this ...” Telimezh smiled weakly. “We have never wanted to betray our emperor. Should anyone approach us with the suggestion that we should do so, we might find it useful to mention our oaths.” Suddenly, he frowned. “However. We find it ... strange that you would feel the need to mention your vows. Our oath as nohecharis is something we would only mention were we threatened with death in an attempt to make us participate in a plot against His Serenity. Then, we would point out that it matters not and we would rather die with our honour intact ... other than that, we would cite our loyalty as reason ...” 

“That would be because it is assumed that a soldier’s default state is to be loyal to his emperor, while a woman’s default state is assumed to be that of marriage.”

“Well, there is nothing dishonourable about marriage, but ...” His ears drooped. “It is because you thought they would not respect your word were it not bolstered with the power of a goddess, is it?”

“Partly that, and partly that we did not wish to appear ... rude? Now that you mention it, a marriage proposal, or something less honourable, even, is hardly on the same scale as offering first name terms to a fellow nohecharis, is it?”

“Hardly. We feel ... offended on your behalf. In truth, we had merely wished to know whether people use your given name without being asked to. We had not assumed that ... to propose marriage to a celibate cleric is inappropriate, already, but something, ah, less honourable ...” He cleared his throat. “We feel a need to assure you of our readiness to dispose of anyone who speaks such insult to your face. However, we realize that the necessity will never arise.” 

“Indeed.” One could easily ignore her goddess, but Edrehasivar was somewhat more of a visible reminder where Kiru’s loyalties lay. 

“We imagine that Cala Athmaza feels very pleased to have been the one to rid the world of Tethimar.” 

“He does not. We know that he has always seen the ability to kill so easily as an unfortunate necessity, and feels ... tainted by it.” So young, so innocent. He should not have been the one to do it. Had the second nohecharei been on duty ... “However, we understand you perfectly. We, too, heard what Tethimar has done to, and intended to do to Mer Aisava, and would have found it ... cathartic to be the one to kill him.” She had never even considered to kill one Drazhar for another. One rapist for another, however ... that seemed much more appealing. 

 

“We are relieved you do not think us ... bloodthirsty and barbaric for expressing such sentiments.”

Kiru stared at him. He could not be serious! 

He shrugged. “Of course, Tethimar had to be disposed of. We just realized we probably should not have mentioned that we might have enjoyed doing so.”

Oh. He had not been there. Of course. He had not heard her vow to avenge her sister. “And we, in turn, are relieved that you do not scold us for not thinking of His Serenity first, or even of Lieutenant Beshelar.” 

“That would be because we thought of Tethimar not as the head of a conspiracy against His Serenity, but as a man who would rape an underage boy.” His ears started to droop, then rose defiantly. “We do think there are very few things more reprehensible than attacking a defenseless child.”

“So do we. Yes. His Serenity has us”, she spoke in the plural to include all nohecharei. “Mer Aisava had no one.” Perhaps, just perhaps, if Telimezh knew what Varenechibel had done to her sister, he would understand.


	33. Chapter 33

When she entered the antechamber, Cala stood there, ears still drooping. 

He cheered up somewhat at the sight of her. “Kiru. There was something thou meant’st to tell me earlier?”

“I take it Beshelar has given no explanation?”

“None at all. I asked him to pretend nothing had happened, and that he has done to the best of his ability.”

Kiru sighed. That request had been rather ill advised. “Let me give thee a hug.”

Obligingly, Cala bowed down, and Kiru hugged him, giving his back a few pats for good measure. “It seems to be a misunderstanding”, she said as she released him. 

Cala straightened. “I had hoped that, but cannot imagine how that might be.” 

“It is complicated. Apparently his objections were not to thine offer, but to the way it was phrased.”

“What?! Oh, please! Not even he can be so uptight and ...” Cala frowned. “Wait. He explicitly told me that he was uncomfortable already with me asking him to braid my hair. Which admittedly, I had done the wrong way round, as thou hast pointed out. However, one would think that he’d approve of my attempt to set things right.”

“Well, yes, but –“

They were interrupted by Telimezh’s arrival. He greeted them and proceeded to open the door to the emperor’s bedchamber to change places with Beshelar. 

“What I meant to say”, Cala continued, gaze flickering to the open door. “Was that an I offered thee lamb’s lettuce in a dessert bowl, thou wouldst not refuse it because I had used the wrong kind of bowl.”

“Of course not. However”, her ears turned as she heard Beshelar approach the door. “Were someone to offer me the same in one of the baskets the gardeners use to dispose of weeds ...”

“Don’t tell me thou wouldst not eat it, as I wouldn’t believe thee.” Cala did have a tendency to get carried away with metaphors. 

“Well, yes, I would. But someone handing me a basket with what I must assume they think to be weeds would just not warrant the same gratitude that a dessert bowl with salad would.”

Beshelar was now lingering next to them. 

“Yes, but thou wouldst eat it! Because thou likest it. That was the point. Were I to offer thee a basketful of something I mistook for lamb’s lettuce and saw you throw it away, then I would come to the conclusion that it is only weeds. Or perhaps spinach, even.”

“And that would be completely understandable”, Kiru replied . “Cala, I think Lieutenant Beshelar wants a word with thee.”

Cala blinked. “Oh” He turned towards Beshelar who had been waiting at a respectful distance, out of hearing range for a quiet conversation, but Cala had not been quiet. “What can we do for you?”

“Kiru Athmaza told us that you do not care what your hair looks like, Athmaza. Did she misunderstand something you said, or is this actually true?”

Cala suddenly very much resembled a startled foal. “Um ... well ...”

He would not lie when that meant he had to accuse her of lying, and the way out Beshelar had left him was one that would still cast an unflattering light on her. 

Kiru gave Cala’s arm a reassuring squeeze. 

“It is true.”

Beshelar frowned. “Then why would you ask our help in fixing it?”

Kiru was not sure whether to laugh or weep. 

“Well, we ... um ...” Cala looked at her as though he hoped she would save him. 

She shook her head. This, he had to do by himself. She could tell Beshelar what she thought to be true, but there was no guarantee he would believe it. And she might even have misunderstood herself, and thus cause even more trouble. 

“We are sorry we misled you. We should not have given the impression that we share your, ah, appreciation for tidyness. We just, uh, thought it advisable to remove one of the reasons you disapprove of our overall appearance, in order to ... um ...”

Beshelar’s ears had lowered while Cala had talked. “We understand.”

Amusing as this would be were it to happen on a theatre stage, she could not let things progress that way. “Lieutenant Beshelar, would you please explain to Cala what you explained to us? On why you have not accepted his offer?”

Cala’s ears pinned back.

“We do not think it advisable” Beshelar replied. “Considering that our trying to do so has caused this whole ... upset in the first place.”

“Exactly. A simple ‘no’ would have been fine, Kiru, but I really cannot stand being reprimanded like a stupid child.”

Beshelar blushed pink. “We never meant to imply that you were any such thing, Athmaza. We only wished for you to understand ...”

“We understand very well!” 

“Cala, please trust me on this. I think thou dost not understand. So wilst thou kindly let Lieutenant Beshelar explain his reasons?”

“It did not sound to me like he was explaining his reasons”, Cala muttered. 

“We do not wish to cause Cala Athmaza any more offense. We see now that we have been oversensitive and petty, and will not repeat such words.“

“We would never accuse you of being sensitive”, Cala snapped. “Petty, yes, sensitive, no.”

“Stop it, Cala. His Serenity managed to talk Lieutenant Beshelar out of resigning once, but –“

“What?!” Cala’s ears drooped. “We had not realized. Perhaps we have been hasty in our assessment ... but we would never accuse anyone of being oversensitive. Such accusations are more often than not an attempt to justify rudeness, and we would never do so.”

“Then we are confused.” 

“Why?”

“We refused to use your first name even though you are not our friend because we feel we cannot bear it. Surely that is ... giving more consideration to our feelings than you deem appropriate?”

“No, not at all. We admit that we were ... miffed that you did not want to be friends with us, but we would not want to impose upon you a familiarity that you do not feel.”

Finally! 

“We never said that we did not wish to be your friend.” Beshelar’s ears slowly rose. “We would be honoured – and pleased – to be able to number you among our friends.”

Well. One was a number, too, Kiru thought, smiling. 

Cala’s ears flicked in happy surprise, but Beshelar was not finished yet: 

“We merely meant to say that we would not drop such courtesies as are appropriate to the status of our acquaintance for the sake of practicality, outside of an emergency.”

“Oh. Then that is what Kiru tried to tell us ...” A pink blush crept up from Cala’s neck, his ears drooping in embarrassment. “And we are to blame. When you appeared so shocked at our suggestion, we, ah, thought to save face by phrasing it as a matter of pragmatism. We have been a coward and worse, a liar.”

“We have been guilty of such cowardice ourself.”

Probably the most diplomatic thing someone as honest to a fault as Beshelar could reply to such severe, but entirely correct self-accusations. 

“However, our statement that the use of first names is common in the Athmaz’are, was truthful. This is why we asked you to do our hair. While we do not, indeed, much care how tidy it looks, we wished to indicate that ...” Cala cleared his throat. “It is a little known fact that the casting of a revethmaz is much easier an one is in possession of some part of the target’s body, such as a hair. Names mean little in the Athmaz’are, hair ... much more.” 

Beshelar did not smile, nor did he look merely pleased. Kiru would rather have described the expression on his face as stunned. 

He did not speak for quite a while. “Then I will gladly braid your hair again”, he finally said. “And I insist that you call me Deret.”


	34. Chapter 34

In the morning, during breakfast, His Serenity asked “Are Cala and Beshelar all right? We think we heard yelling last night.”

“Quite, Serenity.” Kiru allowed herself a smile. “We are sorry for the noise.”

“It is hardly your fault. We cannot recall having heard your voice.”

“In fact, we are entirely to blame, for we encouraged them to resolve their ... conflict then and there.” 

“Oh. We had hoped it had already been resolved. Though we noticed they seemed rather unhappy. So it is resolved, now?”

“We believe so, Serenity. You will see for yourself.”

As though that had been a signal, the first nohecharei entered, and in perfect unison took their places. 

Cala’s hair was, once again, immaculate, and as for Beshelar, he had never looked so relaxed. His expression, while appropriately blank, subtly implied that he was capable of smiling and might do so when off duty. 

 

“Would you keep us company for breakfast?”, she asked when she and Telimezh had left the room. As he had freely told her he would otherwise eat alone, it did not seem so much of an intrusion as it had before. 

“Gladly.”

 

The room they were lead to had morning sun filtering in through the thin curtains. 

Kiru blinked at the sudden brightness. After so many night shifts, it was a welcome change, but marred by her tiredness and the fact that this was, in a way, actually dinner. 

Telimezh poured himself a cup of the calming tea the nohecharei were served whenever they had to go to sleep at unusual times, then hesitated. “We would offer to ...”

“Yes, please.” She held out her cup. 

He filled it and put the teapot aside. “Such are the pitfalls of talking to you, Athmaza. We would not extend such courtesy to a soldier, as it would not be appreciated, and we have observed, in those of our own station in life, that very often ... certain women are more often the recipients of what, in theory, is only politeness than others.”

“We understand. No need to worry about that. You have made perfectly clear that no such implications are intended.”

“Thank you.”

“Recent events have caused us to consider the importance of clear communication. We are very grateful indeed that you have explained to us why, exactly, you find it difficult to talk to us.”

Telimezh smiled. “You refer to the first nohecharei?”

“Yes. In truth we are not sure whether they can be blamed for the misunderstanding ... there were perfectly understandable reasons for it. However, it does make one appreciate the blessings of the Lady of Stars. Clearsightedness is not sought after by many, though undoubtedly, many would profit from it.” She availed herself of a slice of bread, then held out the basket to Telimezh, who also took a slice. 

“Thank you. Yes, indeed. After the first attempt to dethrone His Serenity, we appealed to a number of goddesses and gods. For protection, for forgiveness, and in our first shock we even considered appealing to Ulis for such mercy as ... as he is known to grant.” He put a slice of cheese on his bread. 

Kiru remained silent. She had known that Dazhis’ betrayal had hit Telimezh very hard, but that he had actually wished for death ... she should have paid closer attention. 

“Had we prayed to Cstheio instead, perhaps she might have granted us the clarity of mind to see that, since His Serenity forgives us, we have every right to forgive ourself, and that a nohecharo who is also a cleric of Csaivo is the very best protection one could wish for.”

“Perhaps.” Kiru sighed. “Yet things are not always what they seem, and sometimes, one might not actually wish to know. We are powerful, yes, and we can protect. We are also dangerous.”

“As are we. Being a danger to those who would harm His Serenity is our job.” Telimezh regarded her silently. “There is more to this. An you wish to speak of it ...”

“Not now. Though perhaps ... an we may ask ... in our capacity as healer ... do you still pray to Ulis?”

He shook his head. “Not for death. We did pray to him while you were unconscious with the poison.” Gazing into his teacup, he continued quietly. “We admit we selfishly asked him to not claim you, yet, though we also asked for peaceful dreams. The cleric who sat with you told us that you seemed to suffer from ... not nightmares, but hallucinations brought about by the poison.”

“Yes. That we did. We ... we had not known you had visited while we were unconscious.” 

“We have not. That is. We did not know whether you would wish ... we inquired after your wellbeing a couple of times while not on duty. And of course accompanied His Serenity a couple of times.”

“Which would not be mentioned to us as a visit by you. Yes.” And that her partner would inquire after her wellbeing would be expected, so there was no reason to mention it to her. “We are pleased to hear that you have prayed for us. We ...” She could commend his piety. That was, no doubt, the correct reaction from a cleric. It would be safe. And prone to the exact same misunderstandings Cala had caused by trying to protect his feelings. “We would have liked the thought that you prayed at our bedside. We were unconscious, of course, but after waking up, it would have mattered to us. You should not have needed to go to the ulimeire to pray for us.”

“We, ah, did not.” Telimezh’s ears lowered in embarrassment. “We ... have been brought up to respect the gods, but ... our family is not so pious that we feel we are, ah, familiar with them, if that makes any sense? We feel like we should not visit their houses without the, ah, invitation constituted by something like a funeral? We usually pray in our room.”

It occurred to Kiru that Lieutenant Telimezh not only found it difficult to talk to women, but probably found it difficult to talk to anyone, if even talking to the gods caused him discomfiture. 

“Oh. Well. We understand your hesitation to visit our room, but would like to assure you that, in the unlikely case something like this happens again, you would be welcome to visit. Our fellow clerics can be trusted to make sure we have all the privacy we require.”

“Thank you”. He relaxed somewhat and started eating. 

Kiru, likewise, turned her attention to the meal, and for a while, there was only the noises of eating and companionable silence. 

“We know that piety is not ... fashionable”, she said cautiously when she had finished her meals. “However, if you would like to be familiar with some deities ... we could introduce you to Csaivo.” She smiled. “After all, we can claim to be quite closely acquainted with her.”

Telimezh smiled, too. “We would like that. Very much. And we have no need to be fashionable – we have only ever given thought to ... superficial opinions of those around us in order to not hurt our prospects of advancing in the ranks. Now that we are nohecharis, we cannot rise any higher. The only opinions that need concern us are those of our emperor and fellow nohecharei, as long as our behaviour does not reflect negatively on His Serenity.” 

“Which piety definitely would not.” 

 

Kiru expected that, not only would Maia approve, he would be happy. 

And, indeed, the next time she followed him inside the Chapel of All Gods, Maia turned towards her. “Is is true that you have, ah, encouraged Telimezh to pray more?”

Her ears flicked in amusement. “Is that what people are saying?”

“Yes. We take it that is not the whole truth? We did think it sounded ... strange.”

“We not so much encouraged him to pray, as we encouraged him to avail himself of the places intended for that purpose. You may have noticed that Lieutenant Telimezh is a bit ... shy?”

Maia nodded thoughtfully. “We were mostly preoccupied with our own anxiety when we first met him, but we thought, then, that he seemed very anxious, too.”

“Yes. He merely feared to be seen as an intruder.” Kiru frowned. “Those rumours, do they imply that we bullied our unwilling colleague into an empty show of piety, whereas his true self tends towards such polite distance towards the gods as is deemed fashionable?”

“We are afraid that is about the substance of it.” Maia shrugged. “Of course we did not believe that. We hoped that, perhaps ... we hoped he would share your sentiments regarding our religious habits.” 

“There is no reason why you should care for the opinion of your nohecharei”, Kiru said with a smile. “Serenity.”

“There is also no reason why I should not.” Maia returned her smile before he sat down to meditate. 

 

After finishing his prayers, Maia gestured for Kiru to remain where she stood. “I wanted to ask something else. Mere curiosity, and I wouldn’t want to offend ... Cala’s hair ...?”

“Ah.” Kiru smiled. “If thou hadst assumed this was Lieutenant Beshelar forcing his notions of propriety on fashionably untidy Cala, thou wert wrong.”

Maia made a noise that was delightfully close to a laugh. 

“What it is is Cala showing his respect for his partner by voluntarily confirming to such notions that would not usually matter to him.”

“I had suspected something like that. But did not dare ask, as I fear it might be a fragile peace between them.”

“I think the peace might be stable.”


	35. Chapter 35

In the following weeks, Kiru dedicated a big portion of her time to research. She could not find a maz that would remove the smell of garlic from someone’s breath, but ultimately gathered enough information to construct one that might remove the smell from the surrounding air. 

When the research was done, she informed the Adremaza of her intention to experiment and went looking for a test subject. 

It did not take her long to find a maza who had eaten garlic that day. It had not been on the menu, but the young man had bought food from a street merchant. 

“What do you need this for?”, he asked, which was unusual – most mazei considered ‘I want to see whether it is possible’ a completely sufficient reason for any research. 

“It is our duty to protect his Serenity from everything that could be unpleasant.”

“And you also want to be able to eat garlic before going on duty.”

Kiru chuckled. “That, too.”

Her theory that the sulphur that caused the smell could be bound to a piece of iron proved correct. 

“Has the emperor complained?”, her test subject asked. 

“Hm? Oh, no, of course not. His Serenity would possibly pretend not to notice. Yet we must abide by the rules.”

“So this is not just his public image? We heard that he did not hesitate to soil his imperial white robes to hold his dying nohecharis ... but every wise ruler would do this, regardless of whether he truly cares.”

Kiru smiled. “And any wise nohecharo would not comment on such suspicions.”

“Too late, now.” He grinned. 

“Insolent youth”, she muttered, though in truth, she was relieved. 

 

Never before had she considered it possible that people might suspect Maia of ... of only pretending to be who he was. 

Perhaps, this was a safety concern. Some of the conspirators who had killed Varenechibel had apparently not believed that Maia truly cared about the plight of the working classes. 

She had thought the problem would solve itself once Edrehasivar made more public appearances. After all, His Serenity could not help being himself every time he went somewhere, and if even Kiru had come to like him, then certainly ...

But that was naive. Apparently there were people even less trusting than her – probably they had their reasons – and they would not be convinced so easily. 

What could she do? He was already in the process of introducing some laws that would make life easier for the common people, but it would be a long time until these laws would take effect. Before that ... there were hints, but there was no undeniable proof that Edrehasivar was a better ruler than Varenechibel. 

 

 

When she told Telimezh about the new maz, he said ... nothing. 

He had heard her, his ears indicated surprise. But that, and the blush creeping up to their tips, could mean different things. 

“You ... invented a new maz?”, he finally said. “For us?”

“Yes. Perhaps we should explain that this is relatively minor magic. It only needed inventing because no one had invented it before – or just as possible, just never written it down.”

“Yes, but ... it was just something we mentioned ... we did not expect ...” His ears lowered in embarrassment. 

“We know you are not familiar with social customs within the Athmaz’are. Let us assure you, it is a perfectly appropriate small favour to do to a friend. You need not feel indebted to us.”

“Oh!” His ears rose. “You do consider us a friend?”

“Of course.” Perhaps she should have treaded more carefully. But he seemed pleased. “We did not ask you to use our given name because ... you do seem rather reserved and ... we did not wish to make you uncomfortable.” 

“Athmaza, did we not mention, when you spoke of the theoretical possibility of this, that we would be honoured?”

Kiru tried to recall that conversation. “You did? We think we would have offered, in that case ... just as well. You can call me Kiru.”

He avoided her gaze, though his ears indicated that he was pleased. “My given name is Taniris”, he offered shyly. 

“Taniris.” She smiled. “I am glad to call thee my friend. And now, let us go get some food.”

The street merchants certainly had something delicious with lots of garlic.


	36. Chapter 36

Kiru knelt down at the stone that marked her sister’s grave. Though many years had passed, it had remained where it was, the bones beneath had not been moved away. It was well known she visited regularly, and apparently, the clerics of Ulis had taken pity on her. 

As usually, she brought a flower fashioned from the fabric of an old robe. A blue lily, to replace the one from the month before, which had not wilted, but suffered from the weather. 

Ever since Varenechibel’s death, she prayed the usual prayers, asking for rest and peace for her sister’s soul. 

Or, more precisely, ever since she had decided to serve Edrehasivar VII. It had taken her a while to forgive Ulis for not answering her prayers to make hers the hand that ended Nemera Drazhar. 

Rain fell on her face, obscuring her tears. Under her knees the ground was muddy and wet. 

“Forgive me”, she whispered. “How can I live while thou ...”

She fell silent when she heard someone approach. 

A moment later, her face was pressed into the mud, and a warm and heavy weight was on her back. 

The body of a man, covering hers completely. The pressure on her head must be his chest. So close by, even touching, the casting of a revethmaz would be almost laughably easy. 

Somehow, though, the smell was familiar. 

“Crossbow, to the right”, Taniris whispered 

Ah. Now, casting a revethmaz without seeing the target, or, indeed, knowing who it was, that required some preparation. And was, perhaps, not advisable. She could not predict whether he would be able to shoot before his death, whether he would notice she had cast the spell. Her own survival had never figured in her plans for Varenechibel. 

“Step aside, Lieutenant. We have no quarrel with you.” A male voice she had not heard before. 

“Stall for time”, she hissed. Taniris’ natural reaction would be an angry outburst, and that was not advisable now. 

“An attack on a nohecharo is an attack on His Serenity.”, Taniris said slowly. “Why would we believe that you have no quarrel with us when you attack our partner?”

“We will rid you of that whore. No one need ever know. Step aside.”

She heard a stifled growl. “You cannot guarantee that”, Taniris replied with admirably level voice. “And our life will be forfeit an anyone ever learns we have not hindered you.”

“It is raining. No one is about.”

Not the brightest candle in the chapel, that one. Taniris’ stalling must be blatantly obvious, though he clearly did his best. 

“And you will not speak of it to anyone?”

It sounded utterly implausible to her. Would the attacker really believe that? 

“We only wish to rid our country of this shame. And you of the dishonour. Step aside.”

“Ready. Challenge him”, Kiru whispered. She could only hope that the maz would hold. 

“Kiru Athmaza is our friend”, Taniris said with a voice like freezing steel, not moving from where he was. “If you wish to harm her -”

With a soft noise, the crossbow bolt hit his body. 

He lost no time. In seconds he was on his feet. There was the silky sound of a sword being drawn, and then Taniris was upon the attacker. 

“You will-“, slash “have to”, slash. “do so” slash “over our” slash “cold, dead body.” 

Taniris wiped his sword, sheathed it and knelt next to the incapacitated assassin. “And this”, he slapped him in the face with the back of his hand. “Is for insulting our friend. Kiru, dost think His Serenity will want to question him?”

“Quite probably. Hast wounded him dangerously?” 

“He will not walk again, nor use his arms, anytime soon”, Taniris replied with grim satisfaction. “But we did not aim to kill him.”

“Good. Art wounded severely thyself?”

“Ah. Yes. I thought I had felt something.” Taniris reached for his wounded back. 

“Let me remove it.” Kiru knelt down, placed one hand on his back, took the bolt in the other, moved it cautiously to determine whether it had a hooked tip. It came loose and she pulled it out. It had hardly gone through the clothes at all, only the tip was red with blood. 

She stared at it, sudden anger welling up in her. “Perhaps a revethmaz would have been more appropriate.” 

“Surely, His Serenity will want him alive. It is worth some discomfort. And this wound is not so painful; needst not trouble thyself with it.” 

There was no poison on the bolt, at least. Kiru would not have thought someone would go to such lengths to kill her. Why? The man had called her a whore, but certainly, the rumours could not have spread that far, been taken that seriously?

 

“Excuse us? We believe we heard a commotion ... oh!” The cleric’s eyes widened, his ears pinned back. “Can we assist you in any way, Athmaza, Lieutenant?”

Taniris’ voice must have been audible inside the chapel, so the surprise could only be at the fact that it was, indeed, an assassination attempt. 

“Call the city guards, please. And send someone to fetch the palace guards.”

He hurried to do her bidding, and Kiru stepped around Taniris to glare at their prisoner, who was not able to do much more than bleed – or perhaps had wisely decided not to try to escape. 

“We were praying”, she said, indignantly. “Have you so little respect for the gods?” 

The prisoner stared at her with pure hatred in his eyes. “It is well known thou hast –“ he was silenced as Taniris slapped him in the face. 

“Apologies for interrupting, Athmaza”, Taniris said with all the respect that the would-be assassin had denied her. “I cannot countenance such blatant disrespect.”

“If I am right in my assumptions, he will say even worse things merely because I ask for his motives. I thank thee, though.” She fixated the prisoner. “Try again. And try to phrase your disgusting assumptions in a less offensive way than is your wont.”

The man looked as though he wanted to spit at her, but apparently didn’t want to be slapped again. “You have broken your vows and clearly have no respect for the gods yourself”, he spat. “You are a disgrace to the nohecharei and to the emperor. The gods only know whose bed you have –“

“None but our own, we assure you”, she interrupted him. Poor Taniris was already trembling with anger and blushing with shame. “So you attempted to murder us because of some ridiculous rumours?” 

“It is not a rumour that you are a woman.” The last word was spoken with such contempt it could as well have been a slur. 

“That is all?” There must be more behind it. Surely no one would risk his life to kill her merely because he disapproved of a nohecharo.

In that moment, the city guards arrived, and Kiru gladly let them take the prisoner off her hands. 

She gave Taniris a nod. “Let us go inside. I will have a look at thy wound.”

“I am sorry.”

“What for?”

“Thy hair ...”

They were out of the rain now, and she wiped the side of her face with her sleeve. “Ah. I must look terrible.” The maz she had used to protect her robe from the dirt had of course had no effect on her hair and face, and she could still feel some mud clinging to her face. “It is no matter. Canst undress thyself?”

He could, with some help. The wound had bled and looked clean; the crossbow bolt had been intact. 

“I am sorry.” She touched his skin, warm to her rain-cold hands, and let energy stream from her fingers to close the wound. “This should not have happened.”

Taniris huffed. “’tis hardly thy fault this madman chose to attack thee.”

“It was my fault that those rumours were spread.”

“He seemed to take offense at thy very existence.” Taniris reached for his clothes and put them back on, wet and muddy as they were. 

 

There was a knock at the door and a frightened-looking cleric asked if they were ready to return to the palace. 

Apparently, the palace guard had arrived. 

 

*********

When they entered the palace, they were informed that His Serenity wanted to see them. 

“In this state?” She had done her best, but some mud still clung to her face, not to mention her hair. 

Mer Aisava handed her a pristine white handkerchief. “Please. Follow us. His Serenity is very worried.”

Shrugging, she cleaned her face as best she could. 

Someone – probably Aisava – had had the very good idea to select a small, neglected room, probably an unused storeroom, and place two shabby old armchairs there. 

 

“Please sit”, Edrehasivar VII gestured towards the armchairs. “We are pleased to see that you are able to walk. Telimezh, we hear you were injured?”

Kiru gratefully sat down. 

Taniris did the same, hesitating only shortly before he leant back, a movement that would have hurt had his wound not already been healed. “Kiru took care of it already. We are well.” 

“And you, Kiru?”

“Thanks to our partner’s fast reaction, we are only dirty, not injured.”

Maia’s ears rose, and next to him, Cala and Beshelar relaxed likewise. 

“What happened?”

Taniris indicated with a slight movement of his head that he would let her talk first. 

“We were kneeling at our sister’s grave and had just finished our prayers, when we heard steps approach. Suddenly, someone pushed us to the ground and covered us with his body.”

Taniris’ ears lowered. Apparently he had not been aware she would not recognize him immediately. 

“To our great relief, this person turned out to be Lieutenant Telimezh. He informed us that there was a crossbow aimed at us, and when the attacker asked him to step aside, we instructed him to stall for time. We then prepared a maz to slow down the bolt, as we feared a revethmaz would leave enough time to pull the trigger.” Or perhaps she had just been reluctant to kill someone she couldn’t even see, and thus caused her partner to be injured. 

“We see. Are we correct in assuming that from there on, Lieutenant Telimezh will tell us the same story you would? For an that is the case, we would no longer keep you from your hot bath.”

“Serenity?”

“We have ordered a hot bath prepared for you at the usual place. We have not inquired where that is, but we trust everything has been taken care of.”

“Thank you, Serenity.”


End file.
